Against the World
by TheMathemagician
Summary: "Anyone who tells you that Hidden Leaf is the nice village is a lying liar who lies." The more she sees of the village, the more she hates it. Upon being reborn, a former math major does what she must to protect herself from both the war outside, and the machinations of her own village. Reincarnation!OC
1. Zero

Against The World

"There are no good guys."

-x-

Whoever told you that Hidden Leaf is the "nice" village, the "soft" village, is a lying liar who lies.

It's really not. It's just better at hiding its atrocities. Sugar coating them, if you will.

Look at the case of one of our most famous rogue ninja, Orochimaru. He left the village when the Hokage learned of his unethical human experiments. This is, relatively speaking, "public" information. What the village doesn't tell us, is what was unethical about his experiments. I would eventually learn that the unethical part of his experiments was that he experimented on clan born, specifically, Uchiha infants.

His experiments on civilians and young ninja without any close ties were sanctioned by the village.

The best part about Orochimaru's banishment? He was still carrying out his research _and sending the results to the_ _F_ _ourth Hokage._ He was a traitor in name only, to appease the Uchiha clan.

But you see what they did? They spread rumours of what Orochimaru's research entailed. Coupled with calling his research unethical, they make it look like they disapprove of what he did, not who he did it to.

What surprises me is that not only do civilians believe Hidden Leaf is sunshine, kittens, and hugs, but so do foreign ninja.

-x-

Zero

I remember my mother fondly. I remember long, silky hair the same shade of purple as my own, and the bluest eyes I'd ever seen. My most precious memory of her was from when I was perhaps three years old.

"Hoshino Sekai," she said, pushing a strand of hair out of my eyes. "Do you know why I gave you that name?"

I shook my head. I had never even thought about it.

"It is because you, Sekai, are my entire world."

My mother was young when she had me, only seventeen, and she was alone. She had no family left, no close friends. She had worked as a live in maid for the Tominaga clan. Her employers were of the civilian faction of the wealthy clan, and social standing was of great importance to them. So when my mother's pregnancy became obvious with no father in sight, they dismissed her.

Six months pregnant, alone without a place to live, let alone money to buy food, my mother felt hopeless. Until she met Hanako, formerly of the Tominaga clan.

Hanako was an elderly woman, formerly a ninja. When she was young, she was cast out of the clan for finding herself in circumstances similar to my mother.

Hanako heard of my mother's situation through the grapevine, and decided to help my mother and herself at the same time.

Hanako was paralyzed from the waist down, and had limited mobility in her right arm. Her daughter, who had been her caretaker, died shortly before my mother was dismissed. It wasn't long before my mother's situation made its way to Hanako's ears.

The arrangement was that Hanako would provide shelter and food until my mother was back on her feet, and mother would become her caretaker.

It was a generous offer—Hanako lived on a small stipend from the village for ninja permanently injured in the line of duty. Her apartment was small, but it became my mother's home, and eventually mine as well.

-x-

My mother found work as a waitress shortly after I was born. She spent her days caring for myself and Hanako, and her nights working.

While she worked, Hanako volunteered to look after me.

I was a quiet baby at first, I'm told. I didn't fuss or cry very often. But then I started "babbling" frequently as I approached my first birthday. And as I babbled, I grew frustrated and cried.

Eventually my mother and Hanako figured out what was going on. They noticed a pattern in my babbling. I made the same strange noises every time I wanted to eat. I made a different noise each time I needed to be changed.

"You came up with your own words for things," Hanako chuckled years later. "It was the strangest thing. It took ages for you to start using the real words for things."

I don't remember any of this, of course. But it's not hard to figure out what happened—I was trying to speak my first language, one that doesn't exist here.

-x-

It's not that I always was aware of and remembered The Before. It's also not that it came to me suddenly.

It's like it was there but it took time for me to make sense of it. By the time I was four years old it was all fairly clear.

Once I lived, then I died. And now I live again.

Memories from before aren't crystal clear. I remember I had a brother, but I don't remember his name. Or my name. Mostly I remember things I read and learned. I remember English and math and science. I remember drawing and painting. I remember cars and planes, television and the internet. I don't remember people.

The conflict of memories of The Before and the world I was experiencing now was hard to reconcile, but eventually I managed.

I looked at the differences and the similarities.

There was a mysterious energy called chakra here, that did not exist in The Before.

The geography of The Before and here are completely different.

People here are stronger, faster, and require chakra to live. They have strange birthmarks, strange hair and eye colours, and some have _very_ strange features.

My conclusion is this: I have been reborn on a different planet, orbiting some distant star. The people here, myself included, are what people in The Before would call aliens.

There were still unanswered questions though. The language here reminds me of a language from The Before. I'm not sure which one. Maybe Chinese? I don't know. I never bothered with knowing or recognizing different languages in The Before. Regardless, it is not completely alien to my mind.

And for all the differences between people here and people from The Before, there is also a lot of similarity.

The calendar here has twelves months, and three hundred and sixty five days. They have seven day weeks. Sixty seconds in a minute, and sixty minutes in an hour. Each day has twenty four hours.

There are carrots and rice and apples and bread. There are cows, pigs, and chickens. There are cats and dogs, dear and rabbits. Mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds...

My hypothesis is that I've been reborn many, many thousands of years in the future, after people from The Before found ways to travel through space. The people here are decedents of them, evolved to biologically suit this world. The question remains though, is if humans from The Before advanced enough to come here, why is this civilization so far behind? Perhaps there was some sort of natural disaster? Perhaps the people were brought here unwillingly and just left here without many resources?

Sadly, this world has no records dating back more than one hundred and fifty years, so there is no way to find evidence to support my hypothesis or answer any of my questions.

But for the sake of my sanity, I do my best to accept the explanation I've created as fact.

-x-

Notes: Is Sekai right? Maybe, maybe not. Either way, she has no knowledge of the anime Naruto. Maybe it never existed in her world, or maybe she just never heard of it, since she was never into anime.

Before anyone says anything about how Minato would never condone Orochimaru's experiments... This is a massive AU. Very non-canon. Do not expect events prior to the birth of Sekai to reflect canon. Do not expect people to be doing the same things as their canon counterparts. That said... **If you're really turned off by the whole "Minato condoning Orochimaru's atrocities" I ask that you try the next chapter before deciding not to read this fanfic.** I promise things aren't as they appear.


	2. One

Against The World

"Asking about my origins gave me my first glimpse of the darkness that plagued this world."

-x-

"Who is my father?" I asked my mother as I helped her peel vegetables for supper. She froze for a moment, then sighed.

"You don't have one, dear." She said, an odd lilt to her voice.

"But you didn't just get pregnant by yourself." I argued.

Mother set down her knife and took a deep breath. "As far as I can tell, I did."

I stared at my mother. "What?" I eventually managed.

Am I like, some sort of Jesus baby? Or Anakin Skywalker?

"Let's sit down for this." she suggested quietly. I nodded and followed her over to the couch on the other side of the room.

We sat in silence for what seemed like hours, but could have been only a few seconds. Finally, my mother spoke.

"I'm not sure what happened, Sekai. I never—I don't recall your... conception. Or even that something like that even occurred. It's... at first I... I had no idea I was pregnant. But then it became obvious and I had no idea how or when it happened." she explained in a hushed voice. "I'll never be able to say for sure, but Hanako-san thinks that maybe... Well, I'm a civilian working for a clan that includes ninja, even if my direct employers weren't. Ninja can cast illusions. Make you see or hear things that aren't real. Or make you ignore things that _are_ real... So I just... I really don't know, Sekai."

"Okay. I don't need a father, anyways." I said, understanding the implications of her words.

The most likely scenario is that my mother was raped by a ninja from the Tominaga clan, who used genjutsu to keep her from realizing it was even happening.

I finished helping mother prepare dinner in silence.

-x-

One

It took me one week to realize just how horrible life was in the orphanage. In that time, my few possessions—mostly clothes, Hanako insisted on holding onto anything of sentimental value—had been redistributed to "others who needed them more." That was the theme here in the orphanage. The portions I received at meals were smaller. My were clothes of poorer quality and worn out. Little time was spent on my education. Showers were always cold. And I wasn't the only one. About half of the children here are in the same boat as me.

It didn't take me long to understand why this was happening.

When the orphanage took me in, they asked me a series of questions. One of them was if I wished to join the academy and train to become a ninja. I said no.

At first, I decided the trade off wasn't worth it. More food and better clothes didn't seem like good enough reason to become cannon fodder in the war.

But it wore on me. They fed me enough to get by, but I was never full. The chill from the cold showers lingered long after I'd stepped out.

The feeling of never being full became the feeling of always being hungry. It was no longer a lingering chill from frigid showers, but a constant one. I was never warm.

Then there was the boredom. Once I proved I had mastered reading and writing to an acceptable level, they declared me finished with my required education, despite being all of five years old.

I had nothing to do. I wasn't allowed to leave without an escort, so I couldn't visit Hanako. There was nothing to pass my time with—the few books I had access to were extremely basic and held nothing of value. The other children played with each other, but I had no interest in joining them, and they had no interest in inviting me.

I was the creepy kid of the orphanage. This body I was reborn in was inexpressive. Where in The Before I would laugh out loud at some of the jokes I made to myself, here my face barely smiled. When mother died, it hurt so much. But I couldn't cry. It was like this body didn't respond to my emotions the same way.

Isolation. Hunger. Cold. Each is bad enough alone, but together, it was horrible. It wasn't long before I could no longer sleep.

Sleep was the last straw. Without it, I could feel my mental health decline, my thoughts turned intrusive.

The thought at the forefront of my mind, though, was of what happened to mother. It could happen to me, too, _and I would never know_.

After six months in the orphanage, I asked to start at the ninja academy.

-x-

"Hoshino Sekai."

Startled, my head jerked in the direction my name came from, and my gaze landed on the medic across the waiting room.

I slid off of the hard, plastic chair and walked over to him. He nodded, and motioned for me to follow him.

The path we took was hard to follow. For a hospital, the layout of the building was confusing and seemed impractical. Finally, he ushered me into room 503. The number seemed to be arbitrary. The room next to it bore the number 1156. We were on the second floor.

He set a folder on the desk, and placed some sort of marker on the door. "Alright, kid. Tsunade-sama will be with you shortly for your physical." The medic said, then stepped out of the room, closing the door behind him. Or maybe he wasn't a medic, if he wasn't the one seeing to me?

It didn't matter.

It was my first time seeing a doctor of some sort in this life. Would it be similar to a doctor visit in The Before? Would it be drastically different?

Judging by the room, I figured it would be similar, to some extent. There was an examination table in the corner of the room, two hard, plastic chairs for patients, and a plush one near the desk for the medic. The walls were bare of the posters about STIs or heart disease I was used to seeing in The Before. There was also some equipment I had never seen before, but couldn't really describe. From the chairs to the walls and floor, the colour scheme of the room was, of course, a cold, institutional white.

Without warning, the door slammed open, and a grumpy looking blonde woman strode in.

"Alright kid. Let's get this started." She grumbled and plopped down on the plush chair. She grabbed the file on the desk and flipped it open. "First some questions... You know, age, birthday, medical history, blah, blah, blah... you know the drill." she paused. "Well kid? Don't waste my time, answer the question!"

My lips thinned briefly. How was I to know she wanted me to answer right away? The way she phrased things didn't seem like a fucking question.

"My birthday is December 31st. I am five years old."

"That doesn't tell me your medical history, kid."

It was clear from her tone that she was annoyed with being here. What a rude, impatient woman. Who the hell made her a medic?

"I have none, ma'am. This is the first time I've been seen by a medical professional."

"Che." she muttered, and through the file down. "Course it is. Explains why the file is bloody useless. Those admin fuckers probably threw it together all of ten minutes ago."

"Twenty." I mumbled before I could stop myself. "The file has been in the room as long as I have, which is about twenty minutes.

"Whatever, kid. Hop up on the examination table. Might as well get started properly."

"You really don't want to be here." I stated blandly, my gaze focused on the grouchy woman.

"No, I don't. Say 'ah,' kid." she agreed, and pulled my mouth open. She peered down my throat. "Pre-Acadamy physicals are a waste of my skills and time. Don't know what Dan was thinking..."

The medic poked and prodded me for what felt like ages. I was measured and weighed, blood was drawn and sent down to the lab, vaccinations were injected, and she practically molested me with green chakra. And then she held out a blank piece of paper to me.

"Well? Take it!" she ordered when I made no move to reach for it.

' _My mother always taught me not to take things from strangers._ ' I didn't reply, though I was tempted. Instead I did as she told me. The paper was thick, but smooth, and upon further examination I noticed faint scribbles of some sort decorating the back.

"Chanel your chakra into the paper." She instructed.

I stared at her, unimpressed. I'm five god damn fucking years old. My mom is—was a civilian. I have no fucking clue how to do that. Who does she think I am? Who does she think _she_ is?

"Jeez kid! Just do it!" She growls at me through clenched teeth, her left eye twitching. "...Fucking kid... Face is blanker than the walls..."

The last part was practically a whisper. I doubt she meant for me to hear it. My lips thinned.

"How?"

The medic grabbed my hands, and I'm not sure _what_ it was she did, but it felt fucking weird. Like she was pulling on something inside me, something I'd previously been unaware of.

"You feel that?" I nodded, and she dropped my hands, the pulling sensation coming to a sudden halt, but I still felt whatever it was she had been pulling at. "Good. Now, try to focus on where you felt it, and try to recreate the feeling by yourself."

Her instructions were vague, but I tried to follow them nonetheless. To my surprise, I was able to do so with minimal difficulty.

"Now release it from your hands while holding the paper. And keep holding the paper until I say so."

Again, vague. But now that I'd become aware of this thing inside me—chakra, I suppose is what it must be—it was like a limb, almost. My brain told it what to do, and my chakra did it.

Strange symbols lit up on the top of the paper—I think they matched the "scribbles" I'd noticed on the back.

The medic studied the symbols, like they made complete sense. Well, I guess they did to her. But to me it looked like nonsense.

After a moment her eyebrows shot up and she let out a low whistle. "I'll be damned, kid. That is some seriously skewed chakra... Where's your guardian? The blood work should be done soon and I need to go over the results of your physical with them."

"...I'm an orphan. I don't know who my legal guardian is, exactly. Someone from the orphanage, I assume." Some guardian that is though. In The Before they would have been arrested for child neglect, if not child abuse.

"Right. In that case I'll go over things with you. Wait here while I go check on your blood work. It's been nearly an hour, even the idiots in the lab should have it done by now..."

I sat in silence, still holding the paper.

It took her nearly twenty minutes to return, and when she did it was with a scowl on her face and papers in hands. "Morons," she muttered to herself. "Complete morons. Incompetent morons. Can't do their bloody jobs in a reasonable time frame... I shouldn't have to finish their job for them..."

She slapped the papers down on the desk and dropped herself onto the chair. "Alright. Mostly good news, kid. You are an acceptable height and weight for your age. A bit short, but that's probably just genetics. Your heart and lungs are in good shape, so are your chakra pathways. Physically, you are more than fit to be a ninja, though in the future I suggest incorporating more meat into your diet—your iron levels are a little low for a ninja, but it's a minor thing.

"Your chakra is ridiculously skewed though kid. I've never seen it so bad." She shook her head in amazement.

"What does that mean?"

"The paper you channelled your chakra into is a diagnostic seal, of sorts. It's purpose is to measure the density of your chakra, its elemental affinity, and the ratio of physical to spiritual energies. When I say your chakra is skewed, I mean your spiritual energy dwarfs your physical energy. I've never seen such a major imbalance in all my years."

Can't be that many years. She doesn't look a day over twenty five. "What does that mean for me? Am I unable to attend the academy?"

"What does it mean? That's a complicated question, and I doubt you'd understand the details and technicalities at this point." My eyes narrowed at her words. I wouldn't understand? How fucking insulting. I'm not a fucking moron. "But you're more than able to attend the academy. To be honest, you'll probably do well there."

"Please attempt to explain it to me. I'm more intelligent than you think."

The medic crossed her arms and after a moment's pause, she nodded. "Alright kid. Your spiritual imbalance certainly backs you up there. Here's the deal. Few people have completely balanced chakra. Perfectly balanced would be fifty, fifty. But generally, people fall in the range of thirty five, sixty five or closer, favouring either type of energy over the other. Your ratio is seven physical, ninety three spiritual."

Holy fucking shit.

"Generally speaking, certain jutsu require more physical energy or spiritual energy. The thing is, you can't separate your chakra into one or the other. So if a ninja with the chakra ratio sixty physical, forty spiritual used a jutsu that had a heavy physical energy cost, it would cost him less chakra than someone with a sixty spiritual, forty physical ratio." As she spoke, her tone of voice lost the edge it'd had throughout most of the appointment. Probably because she was actually interested in what she was talking about. "Do you follow, kid?"

"I will have trouble with jutsu that have a heavy physical energy requirement. But jutsu that are powered primarily by spiritual chakra will take very little. Am I correct?"

"Yeah," she grinned. It almost looked proud. "Pretty much. Fortunately, your chakra is very dense, so it's likely you'll have decent reserves."

"Is there anything I can do to reduce the skew of my chakra?"

"Good Question." She nodded in approval. "Your chakra will always been heavily skewed, but large amounts of vigorous physical activity can shorten the gap. At best though, I'd say you could maybe reach a twenty, eighty ratio, but it's unlikely you'll manage that. Physical activity increases physical energy. Mental activity increases spiritual energy. I doubt you can keep yourself from intellectually engaging tasks for the rest of your life, which is what you would need to do to achieve twenty, eighty."

"But physical activity will help?" I repeat for clarification.

"Yes. I suggest that say, if you need to study for a test, you keep your body active in some manner while doing so."

"I see. Thank you for your time and advice, ma'am."

-x-

The day after my pre-academy physical, one of the caretakers at the orphanage woke me up at the crack of dawn, and escorted me to the academy.

He took me to the administration office, informed them why I was there, and then walked out without so much as a goodbye, leaving me standing awkwardly in the middle of the room.

"Take a seat, Hoshino-chan." the blond man sitting at the front desk suggested. He had a gentle face. My initial thought was that he was a secretary of sorts, but the forehead protector around his neck indicated his status as a ninja. Maybe a secretary ninja? Ninja secretary? I had no idea how this sort of thing worked. "Isamu-sensei will be with you shortly. You're a bit early."

Hesitantly, I took a seat near the entrance, hoping I wouldn't have to spend as much time waiting as I did at the hospital. My hands tightly grasped my knees, but otherwise I gave no outward signs of my anxiety.

Awhile later, a boyish looking man with long, light blue hair strode into the office. "You Hoshino Sekai?" I nodded, and he continued, "Come with me. I'm in charge of your assessment, today. You can call me Isamu-sensei."

He led me out of the office and up to a tiny room furnished with a single wooden desk and chair. Sitting on the desk was a thick paper booklet and a single pencil.

"Sit." he ordered, and I obeyed without question. "The first part of your assessment for early admission is theoretical. The test in front of you is comprehensive of the academy's four year curriculum. In addition, it also tests critical thinking skills and problem solving. Answer as many questions as you can. You will not leave this room until I come to retrieve you when your time is up. You may start as soon as I leave the room. You may ask no further questions. Am I understood?"

"Yes, Isamu-sensei." And with that, he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

I took a deep breath, and processed everything I just heard.

I was entering the academy early. From the way things were at the orphanage, I had assumed that wasn't the case. But that wasn't what was important right now. I had an exam to write, and no idea how long I had to finish.

I picked up the pencil and wrote my name where indicated, and decided to look over the entire test before starting. The first few pages tested basic reading, writing, and math—all things I was already well beyond. After that there were questions about chakra and the rules of ninja. A few of the questions on chakra I thought I could answer thanks to my discussion with the medic the day before, but I had no idea what any of the ninja rules were. Then came geography and history, which I knew a bit of. It seemed to focus on Fire Country, at least. I saw some more advanced math—though far from at the level I'd studied it in The Before, perhaps twelfth grade level—as I flipped through, and a bit of first aid. Logic puzzles popped up every few pages, as did decoding messages, and there was a section on human anatomy. The last section seemed to be several "What would you do in this scenario?" questions.

I decided to do the reading, writing and math sections first. I remembered much more advanced math from my previous life, and Hanako had tutored me in reading and writing, which I had picked up quickly. I sped through them with little thought, barely even processing them, and completely skipped the section on ninja rules.

Next I did the logic puzzles—they were simple enough, but I suppose considering this test is meant for children, I shouldn't expect much.

I decided to try the first aid section next. I was able to answer a handful of the questions, but most were beyond the little first aid I could recall, and some were completely baffling. **What** **i** **s chakra poisoning and how does it affect treating a stab wound?** Fuck if I know.

I flipped to geography and history.

 **Name the current and former Hokage of the Hidden Leaf Village, in order.** __That was easy enough—I saw their faces on the mountain everyday. I scribbled my answer, _Senju Hashirama, Senju Tobirama, Sarutobi Hiruzen, Kato Dan._

 **The alliance of which clans provided the foundation for the formation of the Hidden Leaf Village?**

 _The alliance of the Senju and Uchiha._

 **List the five great nations and their respective hidden villages.**

 _Fire Country and Hidden Leaf._ I wrote, and paused to think, tapping my pencil against my bottom lip. I hadn't been taught a lot about the other countries, and while I'd heard some things in passing, it was mostly going to be a matter of guessing. The other four great nations were... Earth, Wind, Water, and Lightning, I thought. The names of the five chakra natures. I quickly wrote them down. The hidden villages... was trickier. I remembered there was Mist, Cloud, and Sand, but couldn't remember the last one, or which went what country, so I did my best to guess. Mist seemed very water-like, so I pencilled it in next to Water Country. Clouds and lightning seemed to go together as well, so I put those together as well. As for Sand... Sand was like, earth-y, so I put it with Earth Country. I figure I had a fifty-fifty chance with that one.

From there, the questions got a bit more difficult. I had no idea which battle was a major turning point in the second war. I didn't even know which battles _happened_. Who were our allies in the third war? No idea, I don't even remember the names of the villages, but not Earth country—I remember hearing about how one of our ninja was famous for killing a lot of the ninja over there.

After the list of questions, there was a blank map of fire country, and I was supposed to draw in the major towns and other landmarks from a list. The location of the capital, Hidden Leaf, and the rivers nearby it were no trouble, but most of the rest was guesswork, though.

Finally, I moved onto the questions about chakra. Thanks to my conversation with the medic, I knew that chakra is formed by the mixture of physical and spiritual energy, and had learned of the five main chakra natures, but soon what little I knew became unhelpful, so I had to skip most of the questions, and moved onto anatomy.

Anatomy had a diagram of the body that I was supposed to label with major weak points, and then there were questions about where to hit someone, depending on if you wanted to disable them or kill them. Some of these were obvious, but a lot of it was beyond me.

I decided to go for the scenario questions next.

 **You are being pursued in enemy territory by a pair of jounin. Of your two chuunin teammates, one of them is injured, and unable to move without assistance. As the team leader, describe how you would proceed.**

Well, that wasn't exactly straightforward. There were so many variables... Like, how far away were we from our village? What sort of terrain? Would the injured teammate survive long enough to get to a medic? Did we have sufficient supplies of food and water? If the village was too far away, we might not be able to get the injured teammate to a medic in time, in that case the best decision might be to mercy kill them to increase our travel speed and prevent them from falling into enemy hands. But if the village is close enough, they had a chance and shouldn't be abandoned. The terrain and severity of the injury would impact the decision of whether or not to flee or hide. I had no idea. There were too many unknowns. Finally, I decided to just write out a list of unknown factors that would impact the decision, and how.

The rest of the scenario questions were frustratingly similar in their lack of details, and I muddled through them as best I could.

Finally, I started on the decoding questions.

 **The following message from the south River County border outpost regarding activity of ninja from Hidden Valley is written in Simplified Leaf Standard Four. Decode it.**

Well. I had no idea what Leaf Standard Four was, simplified or not, but this is why I saved these types of questions for last—I'd try to decode it on my own, which would be time consuming.

"Best get started then..." I muttered to myself.

The message took up about half a page, which was actually a good thing. It meant I had more of a sample to find a pattern. I also had some context. I stuck my pencil in my mouth and cracked my knuckles. This would take awhile.

-x-

Hidden above, Hara Isamu watched the purple haired child leaf through the test booklet.

She was a strange child, he concluded, and it wasn't just her appearance, though that as a bit strange too. Her purple hair was long, straight, and flat. Several strands fell into her overly pale face and clashing with her yellow eyes, but if it bothered her, she didn't show it. She didn't show much of anything, even as she started scribbling her answers to the math questions.

He watched her and her answers carefully. She wrote quickly, he noted, not even stopping to think as she answered even the advanced math problems that were actually beyond the Academy's curriculum, and _her answers were correct_.

Isamu crossed his arms and smirked. He supposed he wasn't terribly surprised. He had read Tsunade-sama's medical assessment, which had detailed her vast amounts of spiritual energy, indicating high intelligence.

She proceeded through the reading and writing assessment and logic puzzles with equal speed, and her answers were once again correct, but she slowed down after that.

Isamu wasn't surprised that she completely skipped the ninja rules, she was a civilian orphan, but he had to suppress a snort when she muttered "fuck ninja rules" in the blandest of tones. He wasn't sure if she even realized she'd spoken.

It was interesting to watch her flip back and forth from one topic to the next. Most children her age without any formal education and exam-taking experience would do things in order, and only skip things if they were completely stuck.

When she answered the chakra theory questions, he noticed the questions she answered covered information discussed in her medical files, indicating she had likely only picked up what she knew from her appointment the day before. He was impressed—she wasn't just regurgitating the information, but also applying it to concepts she hadn't seen before.

He was further impressed with her answers to the scenario questions—other early entrants tended to realize they lacked information, but few of them actually gave detailed explanations of how specific information might impact their decision, and even fewer had the mentality to suggest mercy killing their comrade, even when it was the best option.

But what really surprised Isamu was when she got to work on decoding. He knew she as unfamiliar with the ciphers needed to decode the messages, and had been prepared to make his presence known a bit after she finished the scenario questions, assuming she had skipped those questions as she did the rules, but ultimately decided to see what she managed.

It took her awhile, but after nearly an hour she had managed to decode the first message with surprising accuracy. It wasn't perfect, and the message would have been easy for any experienced ninja, from Leaf or not, to decode, but for a five year old? It was pretty damn impressive.

He let her start on the next one, but appeared before she finished—he'd already seen what he needed to.

"Time's up, kid."

-x-

Notes: Yeah so. Minato isn't the fourth Hokage, Dan is, and Tsunade's still in the village because clearly Dan didn't die. Not much is known about Dan in canon, and while he was portrayed as a really nice/good/moral guy, we're supposed to think the same of the third Hokage and look at the fucked up shit he let happen.

I have done a lot of world building in my notes, filling in canon plot holes, naming things that are canonically unnamed, etc. I intend to share many of these things on a tumblr created specifically for my fic, the url is sekai-against-the-world. It is currently password protected while it is under construction.

This is a WIP. I can't promise that the format won't change as I write this. Once finished I'll probably go back and edit everything to be more consistent. I do not have a beta, and will not be looking for one. What you see is what you get. I am a student, so I am busy with my studies and can't guarantee frequent updates.

All my love,

The Mathemagician


	3. Two

Against The World

"I was so naive."

-x-

"That the one?"

"Yeah, that's the one our Eye mentioned."

"I don't see it."

"Yeah, well, orders are orders. Higher ups decided for us."

Their hands flew through a set of hand seals too quick for the eye to see, but in perfect unison.

-x-

Two

After Isamu-sensei announced my time for the written portion was up, he led me outside to the track.

My physical assessment was next. I did not foresee it going particularly well.

"Alright kid, here's the deal. You are going to run as fast as you can for the first lap—it will be timed. After that, you'll pace yourself for long distance running, and stop when I say so."

Fuck. Running. Ew. "Yes, sensei." I said obediently and got into position at the starting line. At his word, I took off as fast as I could.

To my surprise, it wasn't so bad. In The Before I hadn't exactly been an athlete, and hated running. I tired after just a couple minutes, and always lost my balance and ended up falling flat on my face. But here? I was already running faster than I ever imagined I would, and wasn't even winded by the time I finished the first lap.

It felt amazing. I felt so free. I swear, it must be the whole alien thing. Considering the things actual ninja can manage, I'm guessing the people here evolved to have a higher capacity for this sort of thing.

As amazing as it felt, it didn't last forever. I'm not sure how long I managed to run, and how many laps I completed before I started to tire, but eventually it caught up to me. Still, I pushed myself to keep going. If I didn't make it into the ninja academy, there would be no improvement in my treatment at the orphanage, and I couldn't deal with that. Moreover, I couldn't deal with knowing what the ninja of this village could do to me if I remained a civilian.

I was huffing and puffing by the time Isamu-sensei called for me to stop, and as soon as he did I let myself collapse on the spot.

I closed my eyes and turned onto my back, gasping for the oxygen my body felt deprived of. The coolness of the ground was refreshing to my sweat soaked body. Just as my breathing evened out, I felt a gentle kick to my shoulder. I cracked an eye open and saw Isamu-sensei holding out a water bottle. I pushed myself onto my elbows and snatched it from his grasp. I practically poured it down my throat.

"That was pretty pathetic kid." He commented.

Well fuck him too. That was like, Olympic level shit by my standards. I decided to ignore the comment in favour of quenching my thirst. It wasn't long before the bottle was empty.

"Alright kid, get up. That's enough of a break." No. No it really wasn't, but I followed his instructions regardless, and slowly picked myself up off the ground. "Next is the obstacle course."

The sadistic grin that spread across his face told me enough to know this was going to suck.

-x-

Two hours later, I found myself back in that tiny room where I wrote the exam, waiting for Isamu-sensei to give me his verdict.

After doing my best at the obstacle course, which amounted to getting a quarter of the way through, then being unable to get over this huge wall and giving up when Isamu-sensei started laughing at me, I was made to do as many push ups as I could. Which, to be honest, wasn't many. And then came sit ups. And then pull ups. And on and on it went.

And now I was stuck here in this tiny ass room, but this time with nothing to do but wait.

And wait I did. There wasn't a clock in the room, so I couldn't say for sure how long he kept me waiting, but I couldn't help but wonder if he was doing this on purpose. Well, if he is, it won't work. I'm not actually sure what he thinks making me wait will accomplish, but I won't let him win.

Unless that's what he wants me to do. In which case, that means he _does_ win. Fuck. I was too tired for this shit. Running broke my brain.

An indeterminate amount of time later, Isamu-sensei returned, folders in hand. He set them on the table and sat down in a chair I was certain had not been there before.

"Your assessment is complete, Hoshino-chan." he announced. "Quite frankly, saying your physical assessment was below average for a first year student is kind. Your speed wasn't terrible, but your stamina and strength were deplorable. We didn't bother assessing taijutsu, ninjutsu, genjutsu, or weapons—you'd have failed. Your flexibility is fairly good though."

Well of course, I have no training and haven't exactly been a physically active child, now have I?

After a moment of silence where I failed to reply, he continued. "Your academic assessment was all over the place. You solved the logic puzzles quickly and correctly. Your literacy skills are more advanced than many of our final year students, and your math skills are well beyond the academy. Where did you learn them?"

"Hanako taught me to read and write, and basic math." I explained. "I loved the math, so once I ended up beyond her she gave me books to learn it from. My reading and writing skills improved from having to get through advanced math texts."

That was actually true, though the word learn should probably have quotation marks around it, considering I knew it all already. But it was a refresher, and it was sweet of Hanako to think of me like that. She didn't have to.

The man across from me nodded. "You completely failed all questions related to the ninja rules since you skipped them, and did poorly in regards to anatomy, chakra, and first aid. You flunked the history section, and barely made the cut for geography. However..." He folded his hands in front of him on the table and sighed. "Considering you have no formal education, we believe you did quite well in those areas. What really stood out to us however, were your responses to the scenarios and cryptography questions."

"How so?" I inquired, fiddling with the hem of my shorts under the table.

"You were not expected to be able to answer any of the cryptography questions. There are several versions of the early entrance exams. Students from clans and ninja families are given much different ones. The purpose of the cryptography questions is to catch those who know things they shouldn't and possible spies." Isamu-sensei's face was serious, his voice cold.

I swallowed and gripped my knees. Did they thin—

"Fortunately, I observed you the entire time and witnessed your process for decoding the message. Your methods proved you simply are incredibly intelligent."

I let out a small breath I didn't realize I'd even been holding. Thank fuck. This place... It's not hard to guess that if they thought I was a spy it would end with my death. And while my only fear in regards to death is "what if the next world is worse," I'm well aware that the sweet embrace of death would only come long after I'd given up begging for it.

-x-

I returned to the orphanage on my own. As a student at the ninja academy I was granted much more freedom. My days confined to the orphanage were over.

In the end, it was decided that since it was the middle of term, I would be provided with materials to study until the next term started in just over two months. A week before the new term, I'd be tested again.

For only two months to learn things, they gave me what seemed like an astronomical amount of information to learn. I was given so many books that they had to be sealed inside a scroll, just so I could carry them back to the place that was supposed to be my home.

Though perhaps it wasn't just for ease of transportation that I was given the sealed scroll. Isamu-sensei made sure to emphasize the importance of keeping the small scroll somewhere safe and sealing away the books when I wasn't using them.

I decided to run back to the orphanage. I was still tired, but my skewed chakra and poor physical condition meant I had push myself in this area. It wouldn't be enough to train as much as the average student, I had to do more if I hoped to succeed.

I was going to be a ninja. I was going to be sent out to fight in a war in at most four years. If I didn't want to die young, I had to do whatever I could to become better.

The run back wasn't as bad as the laps had been towards the end, but it wasn't as easy as it was on the first. Still, I managed to make it back without stopping.

That evening I was given a large portion of dinner.

"You had a long, hard day at the academy, dear." The caretaker serving dinner chuckled. "You missed lunch for it, so have some extra now to make up for it."

When I showered, my aching muscles were soothed by the warm spray.

By the time I made it to bed I was too tired to think. I was out just moments after closing my eyes.

That night was the first time in weeks I slept through one without any nightmares.

-x-

After breakfast, the caretaker from dinner the other night took me to a room I'd never been in before.

"Since you're starting training, you'll need more durable clothes." she explained. "Pick out a few outfits. It's all second hand, but in serviceable condition."

The room contained racks upon racks of clothing, and shelves of footwear. The caretaker, who I couldn't help but think of as Two-Face after her personality transplant upon my admittance to the academy, directed me to a section with clothes approximately in my size.

The selection was minimal. It was mostly tops and bottoms of various muted colours in slightly different cuts. I ran my hands over the fabric of the tops and noticed they were all made of the same strange material. It wasn't like anything I'd felt before—heavy, but soft, and strangely dense.

I chose a black t-shirt with the Leaf emblem proudly displayed on each sleeve, as it was on all shirts, and plain black shorts.

Two-face smiled at me and sent me to try them on. They were a bit large, but they weren't falling off or anything and I'd grow into them. Folding up my old clothes, I went back out and grabbed several more t-shirts and shorts to bring back to my dorm. Next I grabbed a pair of standard sandals in my size. I tried them on and frowned. I couldn't say I was a fan, but there weren't exactly any other options.

After upgrading my wardrobe, Two-Face left me alone to study and train, much to my relief. I grabbed the scroll I'd been given from where I tucked it into my pillow the night before, and released the contents like Isamu-sensei showed me. In a puff of smoke, a stack of books appeared on my bed. I looked over them, trying to decide where to start. Finally, I chose geography. I figured it would be easy enough to finish quickly and then move on. I didn't exactly have a lot of time.

-x-

I established a routine over the next two months. To my surprise, I found myself able to recall almost everything from the texts after reading through them only once or twice. I wonder if it was an alien brain thing? Perhaps the brains in this world are better at retaining large portions of information quickly? In a society where information is a luxury to be hoarded, I can imagine the brain evolving to accommodate having to memorize things quickly. Or maybe it was an individual thing and I was simply blessed with a brain that can handle these sorts of things this time around? It wasn't exactly relevant. I was merely grateful.

Still, I had to do a lot of studying, and that meant I had to offset it with physical exercise in order to avoid skewing my chakra further.

I decided to work on speed, strength, and stamina rather than skill, since I didn't want to learn any bad habits that would come back to bite me later. I mostly repeated the exercises I'd been put through in my assessment, but added in a few other things I remembered from The Before, like jumping rope.

I studied in my rest periods, and eventually tried to find some activity to accommodate simultaneous studying. I started to train myself to read and walk at the same time, without losing situational awareness and running into things, or people for that matter. Eventually I hoped to be able to run while reading. I found that push ups worked well for reading as well. I just put the book in front of me and every now and then added in some one armed push ups so I could turn the pages. I hoped that my strength would increase enough that I could sustain one armed push ups long enough to be able to write as well.

I had a feeling that I'd become a master multitasker in the future.

My runs and reading-walks took me through the confusing twists and turns of the village until I knew the main areas well. To be honest, I couldn't help but feel that village was a misnomer. It was a small city, albeit completely different from the cities of The Before.

Instead of wide, paved streets and towering glass and concrete buildings, we had gravel and cobblestone paths, and few buildings taller than six or seven storeys. The typical grid layout of streets was nowhere to be seen, and architecture favoured round, twisting designs over the straight and blocky ones I remembered. There was far more flora in one district of this place than there was in entire cities from Before, but I supposed that was to be expected in a village named for hiding in leaves.

Getting out and training really drove home the fact that the sun I was orbiting was not the familiar but unnamed star I previously did.

I didn't spend all my time training and studying though. I also took time to visit Hanako.

-x-

Finding the hospice Hanako was forced to move into only months before my mother died took some effort. I'd been there before, of course, but I'd never come from the orphanage before, and it was on the other side of the village.

It was a facility reserved for ninja injured in the line of duty. I was unsure of the exact details, but Hanako's injuries were not just limited to her body, but her chakra was affected as well, and without constant care her organs would fail.

In the months since I'd had the freedom to come visit the receptionist had changed. Instead of the kind, middle aged woman from before, it was an androgynous teen that greeted me.

"I'm here to see Hanako, room 1412." I stated as I tried to peer over the counter.

The teen glanced down at me, and raised an eyebrow. "Name?" they asked, snapping their gum as the pulled out a binder and flipped though half the pages.

"Hoshino Sekai." I replied.

"Alright. You're on the list. Please sign here." A sign in sheet and pen was shoved to the edge of the counter. I gave the teenager a dark look, and pressed the paper to the wall so I could sign it, since the counter was almost as tall as me.

"Right, sorry, kid. Next time I'll give you something to write on. You know the way?"

"Yes." I replied. He performed a few hand seals and there was the click of a lock from the door next to the counter.

I made my way through a maze of hallways until I found myself standing outside a door marked by the number 1412. I knocked gently and said, "Hanako-san? It's Sekai." Upon hearing a soft "come in," I pushed open the door.

"I've told you, Sekai-chan, to call me Hanako-baa-san." she tutted in greeting, a warm smile spreading across her wrinkled face. Her left arm moved, and I noticed the files and folders spread out on her bed and the miniature table across her lap.

"What's all this?" I asked as I took a seat in the chair by her bedside.

"Just some paper work, dear. It's fairly boring here, so the village let's me do clerical work to pass my time." She chuckled. "But I'm surprised to see you here after all this time. Did you manage to convince one of the caretakers to bring you?"

"No." I replied, dropping my gaze to the floor. Hanako knew very well that the orphanage only let those over the age of ten or those on the ninja path come and go from the orphanage without escort.

"Oh, Sekai-chan..." she sighed. "You told them you would join the academy in a few years?"

"Not exactly..." I bit my lip. "They tested me. I start with the new term."

Hanako closed her eyes, trembling. She took a deep breath. "Sekai-chan, my dear... I'm so sorry. Aya-chan never wanted this for you..."

"It was my choice." I defended. "It's fine."

Hanako remained silent. I knew what she was thinking. The Leaf Village was at war. It wasn't fine. Eventually, she forced a smile on her face.

"Would you be a dear and fetch the jewellery box from my dresser?"

Bemused, I did as she bade. When I returned with it, she gestured for me to sit on the edge of the bed and turn my back to her. She took the box from me and pulled out a set of beautiful, but plain and clearly used hair clips.

"You need to do something with your hair if you're to be a ninja." She explained as she divided my hair into two sections, leaving out a few front strands to frame my face. "You can't just let it hang loose and in your face like that."

She took the left section and pinned the end of it to the right side of the back of my head with her good arm, and then pinned the right section to the left side, forming an x with my hair. "This is how I wore my hair back in the day. My daughter wore her hair short, so I couldn't pass these clips to her. I'd hoped to pass them to any grand children... So I want you to have them. Go have a look in the mirror and put this back."

Wordlessly, I obeyed. In front of the mirror, I tugged at my purple locks, but nothing came loose. My lips twitched.

"Thank you, Hanako-baa-san. I like it."

"I'm glad, my girl."

The rest of the visit was spent catching up. She was surprised to learn just how skewed my chakra was, and laughed when I told her about my complete failure at the obstacle course. When I told her about the orphanage and Two-Face's change in attitude once I was accepted into the academy, she seemed to age twenty years in the span of seconds, her eyes bright with anger and something I couldn't name.

-x-

I made sure to visit Hanako as often as I could. Not only was it nice to see a friendly face, but she was also full of tips for a ninja in training. With her help I started on stretches and exercises to improve flexibility, and taught me the hand signs and how to best transition from one to another as best she could with her disability. She helped me study by quizzing me on the most important aspects of the book work I'd been assigned. It made learning the theoretical aspects so much easier.

When I finally finished the book work, I had just two weeks until the new term at the academy. I'd intended to focus on physical training, but I found myself incredibly bored without anything to keep my mind busy after just two days.

On the third, I decided to try heading to the library to find something to pass the time, but the library held nothing but fiction—no history or geography, nothing about chakra, not even any math. Part of me was surprised, but mostly it made sense. Knowledge was power, and ninja hoard it. It made little sense to store all your information in a place any one could access, especially since even the most innocent tidbit could be useful to an enemy. Still, it was disappointing, especially since none of the books there caught my eye.

And so I ran back to the orphanage from the library empty-handed. With nothing better to do, I liberated the scroll containing my academy texts from my pillow case and unfurled it. Just as I was about to release my books, I paused.

When I'd first received the scroll, I'd been curious about how the seal worked, but ignored it to focus on what had seemed like a mountain on work to get through. But now I had the time to look into it.

I plopped down on the floor by my bed, grateful that the children I shared the room with were busy in class. I tugged off my sandals and placed them atop the edges of the scroll to keep it from curling inwards, and stared at the seal, tapping my chin with two fingers.

It didn't look like much—just some random scribbles and a few kanji. It was hard to read some of the kanji due to the thick lines, but I was able to distinguish the kanji for space, lock, and open.

With nothing else to be gained from observing the seal as it was, I shoved my sandals aside and released the books. To my disappointment, there didn't seem to be any differences in the seal.

Frowning, I resealed the books and slipped my sandals back on. A dead end.

I wasn't discouraged though. While there was nothing more I could gather from the storage seal and there were no available books to answer my questions, Hanako might know something. And if not, I was sure she would still find away to help me, like she did with those math books.

I stashed the scroll in one my pockets and started the long run to the hospice.

-x-

"Seals, Sekai-chan?"

"Yeah. I'm just—how do they work? How do you put an object much larger inside something so small? How do some kanji and fancy line work let you do that? How—"

Hanako chuckled. "Breathe, dear. I can't answer your questions if you don't give me a chance to speak."

"Sorry, Hanako-baa-san." I bowed my head and used her preferred address in apology.

"It's alright, Sekai-chan. I just haven't seen you this excited since I got you all those math books." She smiled at me fondly, then sighed. "Unfortunately, I know little of seals. It's an esoteric branch of ninja arts. Few people bother with actually learning more than how to use storage seals and explosive tags. There isn't much reward unless you're a master."

"Oh." I murmured, my bottom lip jutting out just a bit. "I still want to know, though."

Hanako laughed. "I'll see what I can do."

-x-

Notes: The tumblr, sekai-against-the-world is up. So far we have a world map that I will be using and some stats.

Fun fact: many people believe the official name of our sun is Sol, but that isn't actually true. The IAU does not recognize any official name for our sun, last I checked.

A few things I forgot to say before. I will for the most part be using English terms for things. Exceptions are things that don't translate well, and honorifics. I see no point in throwing in random Japanese words when there is a perfectly good translation. E.g. Leaf/Leaves rather than Konoha, Water Country/Land of Water instead of Mizu no kuni, but leaving Hokage, rasengan, chidori, and such untranslated.

So far most of the names I've used are actual Japanese names, or canon names. However this won't always be 100% true, sometimes I will use Japanese words as names, as is done in canon. If you aren't familiar with actual Japanese names and naming conventions you won't notice—it shouldn't stand out anymore than canon names.

Also as a heads up, I'm going to be nerfing certain jutsu/abilities/characters/etc. to make things more balanced, because by the end of the manga half the characters were ridiculously, story-breakingly OP.

Thanks for reading. Please excuse any typos, grammatical errors, etc. I won't be coming back to edit, but if you notice a general issue over the entire work, please point it out and I will attempt to fix it in the future.

Love,

The Mathemagician


	4. Three

Against The World

"The Will of Fire... What nonsense."

-x-

Patriotism was one of the defining values in this place. Everyone was so proud to be a citizen of The Village Hidden in Leaves. They spoke of the village as if it was a person. They loved it. They were devoted to it. They held nothing in higher regard. They would do anything for it. They would die for it. They would _kill_ for it.

Whatever you did on the village's behalf was _right_ , it was for the _greater good_ of the village. It was everyone's duty, even civilians, to put the "welfare" of the village first, before anything else. Before yourself, before your friends, before your lover, before your own _children._

It was disgusting.

Everywhere you went its symbol was in sight. I hated it. I hated that as an academy student from the orphanage all my clothes bore the symbol. I hated that as a ninja I had to carry the symbol, cloth and metal, like a chain, tying me down, restricting me—and every other ninja from this fucking village, too. Seeing it reminded me of just how little choice I had in this life. Even the ones I thought that _I_ made weren't even truly mine, I learned. They weren't mine, really. Nothing was.

Sometimes I wondered if anyone else hated this village the way I did. Sure, those who found themselves on the wrong end of our figurative (and literal) sword hated us, but they hate from the outside.

I hate it from the inside.

But it didn't really matter how much I hate this village. It's not like I would be any better off elsewhere.

This world...

-x-

Three

Hanako pulled through. When I went back to visit her a few days later she had a small scroll for me.

"Keep it on your person at all times. Do not take notes." she told me. "I had to call in a lot of favours to get my hands on that. Bring it back when you're done, and I'll get you another."

I was so excited, I actually grinned at her. She smiled indulgently, and shooed me from her room. "I have work to do!" she said, but it was obvious she knew how badly I wanted to go read the scroll.

I gave her a quick hug, secured the scroll in my pocket, and headed full speed towards the orphanage.

I nodded in response to Two-Face's greeting as I passed her on my way to my dorm room. I flopped down on my bed and pulled the scroll from my pocket. I unrolled it, but hesitated, glancing at my stack of notebooks.

Hanako said I couldn't take notes, but... If no one could understand my notes but me, did it matter? From what I'd seen and heard, there was only one language in this world, and nobody speaks English or French. There isn't even a name for the language we do speak, as far as I know. But dare I risk it? I could be wrong, after all. Information is so tightly controlled, it's perfectly plausible that there's at the very least records of English that I simply don't have access to.

I sighed and unrolled it further. I could decide later.

-x-

A week before the new term I was tested again. The written test was quite different from the last one. It tested me only on the subjects covered in the books I'd been given. Needless to say, I aced it. They physical portion was pretty much the same as before, however. Surprisingly I did much better this time. Not like, amazing or anything special, but there was definite improvement.

Which was why on the first Monday of October I found myself joining the third year class.

Apparently I _wasn'_ _t_ supposed to finish all those books, and was further ahead than the class that had just graduated, so they decided putting me in first year would be a waste of time. Of course, my physical scores were nothing to write home about, hence not being placed in the graduating class. While my scores in that area were slightly below average for a first year, it was a drastic improvement from my initial assessment two months previous, and if I kept up that rate of improvement I'd catch up to my classmates in time for graduation.

The class was fairly large—I'd estimate at least fifty other students. Ages appeared to vary, but I was definitely the smallest and likely the youngest. I noticed that boys greatly outnumbered girls, nearly a two-to-one ratio.

After introducing myself at the front of the class, I chose a seat towards the back of the room. Once I was settled, the instructor, Kago-sensei, started the lesson.

To my disappointment nothing he was saying was new to me. I bit back a sigh, and opted to pull out the scroll on sealing I'd picked up from Hanako, but listening to the lecture with half an ear in case Kago-sensei switched topics.

-x-

Eventually we broke for taijutsu training. Kago-sensei led us outside to one of the training areas where three other instructors were waiting. I recognized one of them as Isamu-sensei.

"Hoshino-chan!" he called. "With me."

Inwardly, I groaned. Working with him would not be fun. Between my initial and most recent assessments, I'd learned the man was... difficult, to say the least. It was clear he took pleasure in watching me fail and playing mind games. (Or maybe that last bit was my paranoia speaking.)

The blue-haired chuunin led me away from the rest of my classmates, and I felt their eyes on me as I followed him, undoubtedly curious as to why I was (probably?) getting special treatment.

"We're starting with the basics." Isamu-sensei announced. "Your classmates covered this ages ago, so you're going to have to do your best to catch up, you got that?"

"Yes, sensei."

"Good. First, we're going to start with how to properly fall." Oh good. Falling. That used to be my specialty. I—

My legs were swept out from beneath me. I tucked my head and turned so I landed on my side, rolling to reduce the impact.

"Passable." Isamu-sensei commented, his arms crossed.

I glared at him as I stood. _I wasn't ready!_ I didn't say. That was probably the point. Still, I was more prepared when I was sent flying just seconds after I stood.

Once again, I rolled with it. And then again, and again, until I felt like one giant bruise.

It seemed like an eternity before Isamu-sensei decided he was done _literally_ throwing me around the training grounds.

 _Child abuse! Fucking child abuser, getting off on kicking little kids around!_ I wanted to scream at the tyrant. But this was a place where children are sent to fight in wars before they even hit puberty, so I bit my tongue. Besides, I wasn't actually a child.

 _But they think you are,_ part of me argued. _They think you are, and they do it anyways. They do it to others, too. Others who_ are _real children._

I did my best to ignore that part of me.

-x-

The days started to blend together. I woke up, dressed, ate, headed to the academy, and ran laps until shortly before class started.

During class, I'd listen with half an ear and focus on reading about seals. I learned the instructors were aware that I knew most of the book work, and while they were going over things I'd proven I'd learned, they cared little for what I did to occupy myself as long as it wasn't disruptive. So I swung my legs in little circles around each other to keep myself moving and focused on something worthwhile.

My current scroll was dedicated to the history of sealing, but fascinating none the less. Apparently, the reason seals were called such despite not always obviously "sealing" something away, was because back in the day that _was_ all they could do—seal an object into something else. The only use in the past was storage.

But the Uzumaki clan revolutionized the art of sealing. To understand how they did so, you first need to understand how seals work at the most basic level.

Despite what most people think, when you seal an item away in a storage scroll, you aren't actually sealing it _inside_ the scroll. The scroll is just a medium for the seal. The seal itself is basically a door to a pocket dimension. I wasn't sure myself if the seal created the pocket dimension and acted as the door, or if the dimension was always there and we just found a way to access it through seals, but that wasn't what was important.

Basic storage seals have been around for ages—no one knows who first invented them, the records are lost. But the Uzumaki were the first ones to successfully alter seals, and go beyond their typical use. The Uzumaki clan first started altering seals to fit certain conditions, like adjusting the temperature in the pocket dimension. They adjusted things so that they could seal away food and keep it warm or cold. Then they altered things to freeze time in the pocket dimension to prevent changes to what the sealed away all together.

That was their first big mark on the art of sealing.

The second was sealing chakra.

Most people don't think about explosive tags as sealing something inside a pocket dimension—they don't even realize that's how they work. But that's how all seals work. Explosive tags seal away chakra, and impose conditions on the chakra, directing it to create an explosion. It's funny, but apparently most ninja have no idea what they're actually doing when they use them. Explosive tags are doors to empty pocket dimensions, and when you "activate" them with chakra, what you're really doing is filling the pocket dimension with chakra. The seal then converts it and releases it as an explosion.

The Uzumaki clan were the ones to first figure out this sort of thing was even possible, and they found ways to do all sorts of things from there, leading to their rise to power.

Without them, we would—

A piece of chalk collided with my forehead, crumbling to dust upon impact. My classmates, the immature cretins that they were, snickered at me.

"Hoshino!" Kago-sensei scolded. "Put your scroll away. It's time for weapons practice."

"Apologies, sensei." I demurred, rolling the scroll back up and tucking it into my pocket.

"Do try to pay more attention, Hoshino-chan. It is unbecoming for a ninja to have such poor awareness of their surroundings."

With a sigh, I joined my classmates and instructor by the door, following them outside to the training ground with the targets.

Today, we were working with kunai. Unlike taijutsu where I was still taken aside by Isamu-sensei, after the first weapons lesson I was left with my classmates. Unlike my classmates, however, I stood much closer to the target as I threw the kunai, partially due to substandard aim and partially due to lacking the strength to throw the kunai far enough. Both, I was assured, would come with time. And they were coming, I thought. It was getting much easier to throw the kunai, but my aim wasn't much better.

After missing the target with sixty percent of my kunai, I sighed and retrieved them. Despite my poor aim, I consoled myself with the knowledge that the ones that did hit, hit hard enough that they were hard to pull out of the target, and the ones that didn't travelled a decent distance.

But my poor performance was still upsetting, so I mentally rearranged my training schedule for the evening to include extra kunai practice.

-x-

Two weeks later and even with extra practice, I made no further improvement with kunai. My vision was fine, unlike in The Before, so that wasn't the problem. I asked Kago-sensei and even Isamu-sensei for advice, but their tips didn't help. Throwing the knives at the targets repeatedly didn't help either.

What I was doing wasn't working, which meant I had to try something else. Brawn wasn't working, so perhaps brains would.

So one day after trying and failing to improve, I pulled out a notebook and pen and thought back to my hazy memories of high school physics.

I wasn't exactly a physics person. Sure, physics was basically applied math, but that was the thing. _Applied_ math, which hadn't been the focus of my studies in The Before.

Still, with half-remembered formulas and laws, a bit of experimentation and good spatial awareness, surely I could puzzle things out eventually? I was just glad that my brain was much better at judging distances in this life. It wasn't perfect, but it was fairly accurate, and much, much better than I'd been able to do in The Before. Though next time I'd bring a measuring tape, simply for precision purposes.

I remember when throwing a ball on a flat plane, to achieve maximum distance you should throw it forty-five degrees. If you're throwing along a downwards slope, for every two degrees increase in slope, lower your throwing angle by one degree.

Which didn't help me a lot with aim. But still, I wrote it down in the notebook, and wrote down anything else I could remember that seemed relevant. Then I wrote down the external forces that could act on the kunai as it travelled that I could think of, and properties of the kunai itself that might affect things, including, but not limited to wind, gravity, angle thrown, how hard it was thrown, the mass of the kunai, and shape of it.

Then I stabbed two kunai into the ground to mark my starting line, and two more further down but parallel to the first two. I marked these kunai each with a piece of paper tucked into the wrappings around the handle so I didn't confuse them with the ones I'd be throwing. I then took the others, and carefully threw them at approximately the same angle each time, from the same position. Then, I recorded their position relative to the first four kunai.

I kept at this for a few hours, until the sky started to darken. Only then did I return the kunai I'd signed out for practice and depart from the academy.

As an academy student, I had much more flexibility in meal times, and was able to eat a large supper before heading to my dorm. Though the other children I roomed with were present, they were mostly asleep or reading quietly. I grabbed my pyjamas from the chest at the end of my bed and headed to the showers. Discarding my dirty clothes in the laundry shoot after transferring my scroll on sealing to the pocket of my pyjama pants, I stepped into a cubicle and let the warm water soothe my aching muscles.

All too soon, I forced myself out of the shower before the water could turn frigid. It was something I'd learned I had to do. If I ended up losing track of time and forgetting, the cold water brought back memories of those first few months in the orphanage, which led to sleepless nights. With how hard I had to train my body to catch up to my classmates and offset my chakra imbalance, I couldn't afford to lose sleep.

Returning to my dorm, I grabbed the notebook I'd filled with my observations earlier and settled into bed with it. After reviewing and processing the data, I let myself fall asleep.

-x-

The next day I borrowed a measuring tape from the orphanage. It was much too short to be of any use, so instead I made my own. I cut and glued strips of paper together, then used the measuring tape to mark the measurements correctly. My dorm mates gave me odd looks while I worked, but that wasn't unusual.

With my new measuring tape finished, I went back to the academy and signed out the same set of kunai from the day before. I took note of the strength of the wind and its direction, and then repeated my actions from the night before.

I continued this for several weeks. Over time I purposely altered things, like signing out a different set of kunai that felt lighter and seeing how that affected things. I also started using shuriken. Eventually, I was able to calculate the angle and strength of a throw needed to hit the target. After I could consistently hit the target, and adjust it for different targets and distances, I had to work on my speed of mental calculations. It didn't matter if I could hit the bulls eye all the time if it took me ages to throw my kunai and shuriken.

Once I was certain of the accuracy of my calculations, I stopped actively practising throwing weapons. Instead, I spent my time on my taijutsu and physical conditioning while mentally calculating trajectories required to hit random targets.

-x-

In the months since I'd joined the academy, I had yet to speak to any of my classmates. I had no interest in befriending children, and they seemed to have no interest in befriending me.

The closest I'd come to interacting with anyone was that time this blond first year that was a couple years older than me almost ran me over while I was leaving the academy. He yelled something at me as he ran away, but his voice was drowned out by the bustle of the village and I wasn't sure if he was apologizing or blaming me for getting in his way. I didn't particularly care.

But interaction with my classmates was limited to sparring in taijutsu class, and I liked things that way.

Especially after I heard the gossip about me.

I had expected the "creepy" and "weird" ones. Those I was used to in the orphanage. What I hadn't been expecting were the rumours of special treatment.

"She thinks she's so much better than us." I heard one of the older girls in the class say to her friends over lunch. They were sitting underneath the tree I was sitting in. I didn't know her name, but I recognized her as the brunette who usually sat in front of me. "Getting special treatment—they let her do whatever she wants during lectures! And she gets private taijutsu lessons with Isamu-sensei! I've never heard of _anyone_ getting private taijutsu lessons before, and neither has anyone else I've asked in my clan."

"I know right? It's not fair! _I_ want private lessons with him!" One of the other girls, probably a Yamanaka by the looks of her, giggled. "He's _sooo_ dreamy!"

"They _say_ it's because she's way behind in taijutsu." The first girl continued, waving her chopsticks. "But if she's so far behind why is she in the third year class? She's like, five."

"Yeah!" A third girl joined in. "Plus the times she does join us for spars she doesn't do that bad. Sure, her forms are a bit sloppy, but she's fast, and her punches hurt more than some of the boys' do!"

"I bet Isamu-sensei is teaching her some secret taijutsu style, and that's why she's so bad at the standard one—she's not used to it."

"It's not fair! Why her? She's just some orphan."

"Maybe she's the secret love child of some super important ninja!" The maybe-Yamanaka suggested.

"Psh, yeah right." The brunette dismissed, finishing the last of her lunch. "You guys done yet? I want to go see if Isamu-sensei can help me with my chakra control."

"But Suzu-chan, you have really good chakra control!" The third girl frowned, slightly confused. "Why—ooooh. I see. Yeah. I'm done."

The group of girls quickly packed up and set off to find Isamu-sensei, giggling the whole way.

I almost felt bad for the guy.

Once they left, I jumped down from the branch I'd been lounging on and headed back to my classroom. I slipped into my seat and folded my arms on the desk, resting my head on top of them. I felt strange. It wasn't that I cared what the other girls thought of me. They were just silly little girls, jealous that their crush was spending time with me. No, what bothered me was the accusations of special treatment.

I hadn't really thought about it before, but it was true that I was the only one getting one-on-one taijutsu training, even if it _had_ been cut back to twice a week instead of everyday. I mean, I knew it was because I really _was_ way behind, but I'd assumed this wasn't something too unusual—that it wasn't the norm, but it happened every now and then. From the sounds of that one girl, I was wrong. And I mean, I knew they let me do my own thing in class because I already knew the material. Was that not typical? I couldn't be the first student to be way ahead.

What really bothered me was _why_ I was getting special treatment. I wasn't anyone special—an orphan, born to a poor, clanless teenager. Maybe that Yamanaka girl was onto something. I knew nothing about my father. My mother knew nothing about my father. But surely my father had put things together, and knew I was his kid. He knew what he did to my mother, and likely knew she got pregnant since it resulted in her losing her position. Maybe he was important? Maybe he had some sort of influence?

But Hanako and mother assumed he was from the Tominaga clan, and for good reason. But while the Tominaga were an incredibly wealthy clan, they weren't particularly influential. Their money was the only thing going for them, compared to other clans. They had influence over non-ninja matters through their wealth, but it didn't give them any real leverage over the Hokage—if he wanted their money he could just increase their taxes. As for other ninja high-up on the food chain, accepting bribes was seen as treason—some of them had enough power to really fuck over the village, even if it was just by looking the other way at someone's activities. Not to mention, not just any random clan member could exercise what little influence they did have. It would have to be the main family, if it was due to a clan.

So maybe they were wrong, and my father _wasn't_ a member of the Tominaga clan, but someone who did have influence. I couldn't be from a clan with a bloodline limits—they would have snatched me up regardless of the circumstances, less I activate it. That goes for clans with secret techniques as well. If I were, then while I wouldn't be able to learn their techniques alone, I would have a predisposition to their techniques, and certain obvious clan traits. Over time, these predispositions can eventually turn into bloodline limits, so they keep track of their members, in case that one bastard kid is the one who inherits or passes on the new bloodline. And again, only the main family would have enough influence—which means if I was a clan bastard, I'd be connected to the main family, hence even less likely to be left outside the clan.

But the rest of the clans, the ones that _don't_ have secret techniques or bloodlines, are generally worse off than the Tominaga in terms of influence.

That left individuals.

It wouldn't be easy, but after finishing up my method for throwing weapons, I could use another project.

-x-

Since my heritage was a more sensitive topic than my previous topic, I decided to first make my first basic storage seal to keep my notes and research in.

It wasn't advised to attempt to make a seal without supervision (or better yet, knowing what the fuck you're doing), but I didn't really care. I mean, what's the worst that can happen? I die? Meh, been there, done that.

Unfortunately, I no longer had the storage scroll from the academy, and couldn't just copy it, and the scrolls from Hanako didn't actually give instructions—they were still just theory and history based. But I figured I knew enough to take a stab at making one.

So I wandered around the village, looking for a secluded spot to practice without drawing attention. My usual haunts, the orphanage, the hospice, and the academy, were clearly unsuitable, so I needed to find somewhere else.

Eventually I settled on wandering deep into one of the forests by a park. It wasn't a training ground, so I was safe from stray weapons and jutsu, and none of the kids really ventured too far into these woods.

I plopped down by a random tree and rummaged through my bag for my notebook and the sealing ink Hanako bought for me. Most people used brushes, but I didn't like them, so instead I used a fountain pen, since it was just the ink that mattered.

The ink was expensive, and I didn't want to run out too soon, so I decided to first sketch my prototype with a pencil.

Connections, balance, order, and flow...

After a half hour of erasing, drawing, and redrawing, I was ready to test my seal.

I filled my pen with ink and copied the array onto a blank page in my notebook. Then, I tore another page out and ripped it into rough squares.

My first attempt wasn't a complete failure, but it wasn't a success either. I was able to seal a few squares of paper away, but I couldn't release them.

My second attempt took me another hour of re-configuring the seal and going over my kanji choices. This one released the squares... sort of. It released their ashes.

I spent hours redesigning the seal until I finally managed one that was able to store more than one item, release _all_ the items, and not damage anything.

Fuck, it was like I was back in intro comp sci. I was far from a programming expert, but I did have to take two comp sci classes and learn basic java. I aced the classes, but there were hours spent trying to figure out which line of code was causing the bug. And if you fixed one thing it fucked up another.

Just like seals.

Once I had a successful seal, I re-sketched the failed seals and noted what went wrong with them and where it did. By the time I finished, I was straining my eyes in the dark. I sealed my notes into the functional seal and then tucked the seal into my sandal. The paper rubbed against my skin awkwardly, but I would figure something out later. It was long past time to return to the orphanage.

-x-

Author's Notes: Thanks for the reviews/favourites/follows everyone. I really appreciate them. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I even included a canon cameo, can you tell who? I have finals in a week and instead of studying I wrote this. Good for you, bad for me, I'm afraid.

Lots of exposition this chapter, and more to come in the next, I think. An Sekai has started asking questions—but are they the right questions? Who is her father? Why is she receiving special treatment? Is she making a mountain out of a molehill?

Find out next time! Or not. Probably not. It's gonna be awhile. It's no fun if I tell you everything right away.

Oh, also... The cover image was drawn by myself. I posted a larger version over on sekai-against-the-world, and also a clean version there as well. There are other extras there too, remember. You can ask questions about the story on anon, too.

Once again, please forgive any errors.

All the best,

The Mathemagician


	5. Four

Against The World

"What a tangled web they weave."

-x-

"I don't see why I should help _you_." The woman snarled at the man standing at her door step. "I'm not involved anymore. I'm done. _Done._ I've more than paid my dues."

"Please, if not for me, then for them. They don't deserve this—it's not their fault. I'm begging you." The man dropped to his knees, his gaze pleading. "We can help you. You won't be getting nothing out of this."

"I said no." The woman retorted, and slammed the door in the man's face. She listened for his footsteps to fade away. Once they did, she spoke once more.

"I won't have anything to do with your lot anymore."

-x-

Four

I copied a storage seal onto the inside of my sandals. Eventually I hoped to have a storage seal on my person, but I wasn't confident enough for that quite yet. Who knows what I could fuck up?

So my sandals will have to do. I chose them because they are almost always on my person, and even when not they were usually close by.

With my own personal and secret storage seal, I no longer hesitated in taking notes from the scrolls I got from Hanako. I wasn't sure if English existed here, but my notes wouldn't be left out for just anyone to stumble across. To be safe, I decided to switch between English and French in my notes, though I wasn't nearly as good with French, but hey, inconsistent grammer and spelling could only help me here. In addition, I alternated the way I wrote letters, somewhat. Sometimes My l's were straight lines, other times they were loops. Some times my E's were blocky, other times curly. Sometimes I even substituted in numbers. (Leetspeak ftw, n00bs.) And also throwing in Latin abbreviations and phrases, acronyms, chat speak, whatever. (Thank you internet.) Anything to make it more difficult to find a pattern if you don't speak English and/or are unfamiliar with slang born alongside technological advancements of the twenty-first century.

Even to myself, my notes were a bit hard to look at, but keeping up with it would take care of that, and I'd soon be reading and writing like that just as well as I'd adapted to the language of this world.

It would still be a bit suspicious if anyone were to find my notes, but worst case scenario? They send a Yamanaka to mind rape me and get fuck all because _I still think in English_. Even remembering events in this life, I've mentally translated it all into and remember it in English. I process and translate things so quickly no one even notices my short pauses before speaking.

And besides, even if they have records of my native language, I highly doubt anyone is even conversationally fluent.

Still, I knew I wouldn't feel completely secure until I managed to create a seal only I could open, and keep it on my person.

-x-

The whole "look for dad" thing was a lot harder than I initially thought. While some information was public, there weren't convenient lists detailing who was in charge of what department and who was famous. And even when those things were recorded somewhere I could find them, there were almost always no pictures.

There _were_ cameras in this world, but they were obsolete by the standards of The Before. They were big, clunky things that took up to thirty seconds to take a picture. On top of that, they were highly regulated. Very few people had access to one. There were a handful of licensed photographers, but they were extremely expensive. Most photos were for record keeping purposes and official events.

It was frustrating, because how the fuck would I know if some dude could possibly be my father if I didn't even know what he looked like?

It was easy enough to rule out the men from clans and women, but it still left a lot of possibilities and unknowns.

It was maddening.

-x-

About half way through the term, Kago-sensei started teaching us ninjutsu. I was happy for something new to learn, but to be honest the subject stumped me.

We'd learned the twelve zodiac hand seals already, but I never did understand how they actually worked. I figured it would make sense when we actually started on learning ninjutsu, but alas, it was not so.

No matter what I did, I couldn't for the life of me get the transformation jutsu to work. My hand seals were perfect, but I might as well have been flailing my hands around in a poor attempt at jazz hands. And it wasn't just that I wasn't getting the jutsu to work _right_. It was that nothing was happening at _all_.

I just didn't understand.

"Kago-sensei? Do you have a moment?" I asked one day after class as the other students trickled out of the room.

"Of course, Hoshino-chan." Kago-sensei smiled. "Is this about the transformation jutsu?"

"Yes, sensei. I just—ninjutsu as a subject isn't making much sense to me. How does moving your hands a certain way cast a jutsu?" I asked, my brow furrowed in confusion.

Upon hearing my question, Kago-sensei's expression could best described as a "light bulb moment."

"Ah. I see. My apologies Hoshino-chan. It hadn't occurred to me you hadn't learned this." Sensei blushed. "I completely overlooked it, it's usually taken care of by parents for ninja-born students and in first year for civilian-born ones."

"Eh?" I titled my head to the side. That answered nothing.

"There is nothing special about the hand signs themselves—they are more _instructions_ of how to move your chakra, to shape it, for the jutsu. Each sign corresponds to a different movement of chakra." Kago-sensei lectured.

"But how does everyone know which chakra movements are associated with each sign?"

"Young children, usually up to three or four years of age, have chakra very similar to their parents. This allows the parents to harmlessly insert their own chakra into their children and move it for them while teaching them the hand seals. It is generally easier for the mother to do this, but the father can as well, though they usually have to start earlier. After the age of about five years children's chakra becomes too... personalized, so to speak, for their parents to insert it without harming them, unless they have medical training."

"But... then what about children like myself? Who never had a parent to do that?" I asked. Plenty of civilian-born ninja existed, there had to be a way.

"That was actually one of the villages first major struggles." Kago-sensei chuckled. "Clan ninja have been doing this for generations, and before the formation of the hidden villages ninja only came from clans. Initially, they had medics do it for civilian children, but that became a burden on the medics as the number of civilian-born students increased. Eventually, someone created a genjutsu that shows students how to move their chakra. I had assumed you're already experienced it."

"Oh. That... makes sense, I guess." I nodded. I could have done without the history lesson though. "But..."

"Yes?" he prodded.

"Why do people _always_ use them whenever they use jutsu?"

Like, what the fuck. If it was just a matter of moving your chakra a certain way, why not just do that without the hand seals so people can't predict what you're doing?

"Generally, as young children ninja have the association of making a hand seal and shaping their chakra—they don't even have to think about it, it's instinctive. But without the hand signs they have to focus on each movement of chakra, consciously direct it, and that is generally slower for most ninja." Kago-sensei explained with a smile. "You're very interested in how's and why's, aren't you Hoshino-chan?"

"I—yeah. I guess." I mumbled. "I like to know how things work."

"And that's what makes you unique—most children your age, most ninja even, just care that it does. Now, I can't cast the genjutsu myself, but I believe Iruka-sensei can, and he should be free at the moment if you'd like to do it now?"

"Sure." I nodded, clenching my fists nervously. I couldn't help but think about what genjutsu had done to my mother, and willingly subjecting myself to one made my instincts scream in protest. But I had to do it, so I would.

The chuunin didn't seem to notice my unease and led me down the hall to an unfamiliar classroom, where a man with a scar across his nose was marking papers at a desk.

"Iruka-sensei?"

"Ah, yes? Can I do something for you?" The man, Iruka-sensei, asked.

"Hoshino-chan brought it to my attention that she has yet to undergo the hand seal genjutsu, I was wondering if you could cast it on her?"

"Of course. Just give me a moment to finish up and I'll be right with you." Iruka-sensei smiled, holding up a red pen. "You can take a seat, ah—Hoshino-chan was it?"

I nodded and took a seat in the front row as Kago-sensei excused himself.

I didn't have to wait long, and after making sure I was ready, the unfamiliar chuunin cast the jutsu.

If I hadn't known what was going to happen, I never would have guessed that I was in a genjutsu. It felt so natural to just start practising the hand seals, and as I made each one my chakra shifted, like it was following my command. I repeated them several times, familiarizing myself with the way my chakra responded to them.

"Why don't you try doing it yourself now?" Iruka suggested, startling me. The genjutsu had been lifted after my last run through of the seals, and I hadn't even noticed.

Disturbed by the subtlety of the genjutsu, I swallowed and took a deep breath. It was terrifying to know that I couldn't pinpoint when it started and when it ended, and not only that, but everything I'd done in it seemed completely natural, like it was my own decision to practice the hand seals.

I pushed my thoughts aside and focused on doing as Iruka-sensei suggested. For the first time outside of the genjutsu, I could feel my chakra move when I cycled through the zodiac.

"Thank you for your time, sensei." I bowed politely.

"It worked, then?" he smiled. "I'm glad. Have a good evening, Hoshino-chan."

With that, I was dismissed, and decided to head out to my usual training field.

I took a moment to best organize my time, ultimately deciding to first run through my taijutsu forms, then move onto strength training, and finally practising the transformation jutsu.

It was my fourth month in the academy, and my taijutsu had improved by leaps and bounds. I was still a bit sloppy, though. In spars I had trouble smoothly moving from one attack to another and from offence to defence, but Isamu-sensei said that would just take time and practice.

He was impressed with the improvements to my speed and strength, though, and even let me sign out training weights for prolonged use so I didn't have to turn them in before I went back to the orphanage every evening, and could wear them at all times.

As a result, I was building up some real muscle, and whenever I looked at myself in a mirror, I couldn't help but be impressed by how toned by arms were getting, though I was by no means buff, and I never would be.

After working up a light sweat with my taijutsu forms and drinking some water to stay hydrated, I moved onto strength training. It was amazing to me that just six months ago I could barely manage a dozen push ups, but now I had worked my way up to over one hundred, and then could move on to other exercises without being completely exhausted.

At first, I worried about pushing my body too far. I vaguely recalled hearing that weights could stunt a child's growth back in The Before, and other dangers of over doing it, but I haven't had any problems, and Isamu-sensei wouldn't let me do something that was detrimental to my growth as a ninja. Either I was misremembering or once again, it was an alien thing. I'd already noticed that my bruises, cuts, and scrapes heal faster than they did in The Before, so I figured that might have been balancing out any damage.

After finishing my last set of pull ups, I finished off my water bottle and went to refill it at training field's tap.

I lay down on the grass, basking in the coolness from the ground. Once I had cooled down sufficiently, I reluctantly stood to practice ninjutsu.

With Kago-sensei's image in mind, I attempted to preform the jutsu.

 _Dog, boar, ram._

 _Poof!_

I coughed on the smoke the jutsu produced and tried to wave it away, but screamed when I caught a glimpse of my hand.

It was... I didn't even have words. My arm was large and muscular, like Kago-sensei's, but my shoulders and my hand had stayed the same size, except for my finger nails, which were huge. My skin was blotchy, a mix my own skin tone and my instructors.

My lip curled in disgust and horror. It was just _wrong_. I stared at it in horror for ages before I realized that if I dispelled the jutsu I could make it go away.

And then I realized I didn't know _how_.

Eventually, I figured out that disrupting my chakra flow would do the trick, but that experience was enough for me to put my ninjutsu training aside for the time being.

-x-

A kick swung towards my face and I bent over backwards to dodge, placing my hands firmly on the ground. I kicked off the ground into a flip, my foot connecting with the underside of my sparring partner's chin. The force of the blow sent him reeling backwards, giving me enough time to right myself back to my feet.

Instead of waiting for him to come at me again, I charged forwards. He dodged my first punch, but on my second he grabbed my arm, flipped me over the shoulder, and slammed me to the ground. I let out a pained groan, but was too slow to stand because before I knew it, he had me pinned down, and Kago-sensei was calling the match.

My lips thinned in displeasure as my opponent and I formed the seal of reconciliation and then left the ring to make room for the next pair.

Part of me wanted to make excuses, I was barely seven years old and he was the largest boy in class. But excuses were pointless. I had just over a year to go until graduation, and then I'd be sent out to fight grown adults. I had to be good enough that a size and weight advantage didn't result in an automatic loss. I needed to hit faster and harder if I wanted to survive, to take out my opponents before they could fight back.

My gaze shifted to my sparring partner, and despite my loss, I was proud of the nasty bruise forming just under his chin.

-x-

Time passed and soon it was the end of February. I made little progress on finding a potential lead on my paternity, so I set aside that project for another time and focused on my training.

End of year testing was coming up, and I was frantically trying to perfect the transformation jutsu in time. I'd improved, but barely, and nearly everyone else was at least decent with it. After asking Kago-sensei, I found out my issues with the jutsu stemmed from my skewed chakra. Apparently the jutsu used mostly physical energy, and my spiritual energy was disrupting it.

It was frustrating, because there wasn't much I could do about the issue. My classmates who had trouble, were having difficulty due to chakra control and could work on control exercises to improve. But I was already doing my best to build up more physical energy, but like that medic said, even at my most balanced, I'd still have a severe skew by regular standards.

On the bright side, aside from that I was confident with my achievement. Ever since I joined the class I was at the top for book work, and over the term I'd wormed my way up to fourth place in taijutsu and first in weapons. Overall, I ranked fifth in the class. (My ninjutsu rank was nearly dead last, sadly.)

As for seals, I'd finally designed a storage seal that I felt confident enough to place on my own body. Hanako had finally passed on scrolls that went beyond theory and touched on application, and with the knowledge gained from those scrolls I was nearly certain it was safe, and so, late one night I locked myself in one of the orphanage bathrooms and got to work.

After much deliberation, I finally decided to place it on my inner thigh. From what I'd read, placing seals on skin, on living beings, wasn't like placing them on other mediums. As I drew the seal I had to channel my own chakra through it to essentially tattoo it onto myself, else it would eventually wash off.

The fact that I'd summed the process up as "tattooing it on myself" should have given me a hint to what it would feel like, but I was still unprepared for the _pain_.

Months of sparring with my classmates and Isamu-sensei had improved my pain tolerance drastically, but none of it had prepared me for _this_.

It took everything I had to keep my hand steady as I drew the seal onto my sensitive flesh. While it was an ideal place to hide it from others, it wasn't in terms of pain.

It was rather disconcerting to see _steam_ trailing after the pen and ink, but in the end it was worth it. I had a secure place to store my notes. It wasn't practical to store any old thing there, so I also inked one onto my left arm, just above the elbow.

I was extremely proud of the seal, to be honest. It was completely of my own design, and the pocket dimension it was linked to even lacked a time component, so I could seal away perishables without worry of them spoiling.

The first thing I did after finishing the seal on my arm was sneak down to the kitchen and seal away a large container of clean water and two dozen niNRG brand meal replacement bars. You never knew when you'd need it, after all, and I doubted anyone would notice.

Instead of going straight to my room, I stopped by the bathroom again, to admire my seal. I was very pleased with the design—two Fibonacci spirals connected together, with encircled kanji cluttered at the bottom, connected with straight lines to additional kanji closer to the top of the seal. It was beautiful—a work of art, if I did say so myself.

Content with my progress, I returned to my dorm, curled up in bed and promptly fell asleep.

-x-

The next day I was exhausted and my arm and thigh still stung slightly, but I forced myself to go through my morning exercise routine, regardless, and upon completion I plopped down in my seat and rest my head on the desk.

"Hoshino! With me!" Isamu-sensei ordered, causing me to snap my head up in surprise.

"Sensei...?" I asked hesitantly, noticing that he'd left off the usual honorific.

"Now." he snapped.

"Yes, sir." I nodded and scrambled to my feet. He turned on his heel and marched out of the classroom as soon as he was sure I was following. The few students present snickered at me as we left.

He led me down to the tiny room I'd written my entrance exam in and motioned for me to sit at the desk. Instead of speaking, he spent an indeterminate amount of time pacing in front of me. (Mind games again, I noted.)

It took all my self-control not to flinch when he slammed his hands down on the desk. "Do you have _any_ idea how stupid, how _dangerous_ , placing an untested seal _on your own goddamn body_ is?"

"I—what?" I blinked in surprise. He notic—?

"Of course I noticed, you stupid child!" He hissed, like a fucking mind reader.

I blinked, but remained silent.

"Well?" He barked. "I'm waiting!"

"Uh... Well... I mean, obviously it was a bit—dangerous... but I tested it on another medium first and was well aware of the risks—"

"Well aware of the risks, you say?" He scoffed. "You could have lost a limb! You could have _died_!"

"I _know!"_ I growled. "I _said_ was well aware of the risks! I knew what could happen!"

"And you did it anyways?" He gaped at me in disbelief, and shook his head. "I never would have thought you'd be so reckless—your classmates, I'd expect it from, Hoshino-chan, but you? I thought you were smarter than this."

I shrugged. "Worst case scenario I died, and I'm hardly afraid of death. It's but the next great adventure, you know." I couldn't help but laugh, actually _laugh,_ at what I said. Man, who knew just how right Dumbledore was? (Answer: I did.)

Isamu-sensei stared at me in disbelief. "I don't—I can't... Wait here, Hoshino-chan, I'm getting someone to come make sure your seal is stable and won't blow your arm off if you use it."

And with a poof of smoke, I was alone. Huh, I think he was actually worried about me. It was almost cute.

I huffed and crossed my arms, then tilted my head back and stared at the ceiling. My seal was _fine_. I'd already used it! I'm surprised he hadn't realized that himself.

When my sadistic sensei returned, he was accompanied by a woman with scarlet hair down to her ankles.

"So you're, like, the kid my scrolls have been going to, eh?" She said.

"Ah—I guess? I was never told where Hanako got them from." I answered. "Oh, um. Thank you? I appreciate them?"

She raised her eyebrows. "You can thank me by not being so stupid in the future, yeah? Well, let's see the damage."

My lips thinned. "There is no damage." I retorted and lifted my sleeve to give a better view of the seal. "But have a look, I guess."

She snorted, but approached me and grabbed my arm, inspecting the seal closely. After several minutes she let go of my arm and stepped back.

"Where did you, like, find this one?" she asked. "I don't think it was in any of the scrolls."

"I designed it myself." I replied, but she eyed me doubtfully.

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Hm... Well, it's, like, a solid design, and looks to be fairly stable. I see it's intended to be a stasis storage seal only you can open, yeah?" I nodded. "I thought so. It's like, well balanced, and flows well. It should work just fine and be safe."

"It does." I affirmed, and her eyebrows rose again.

"You've already used it? That was dangerous, kid."

"Yes, I did. And I tested it on paper first, I wasn't going into this blind, I knew the risks and did my best to mitigate them." I defended.

"You draw your first seal on your body and like, you think you weren't going into this blind?" she asked incredulously.

"It's not my first seal." I scoffed. "This is my fourth, and the first I've used on myself. My previous versions all worked just fine, too, for the record."

"Let's see them." she demanded, and pulled out a scroll from the pouch at her hip. "Sketch them in pencil on this."

"Hold on." I told her, and tugged off my sandal and held it out to her, indicating the seal. "My first successful design is here. It's empty now, though."

She looked at me strangely, but took my sandal and examined it. While she did so, I released a pencil from the seal on my arm and sketched out my other two seals.

She took her time examining them as well. When she finished, she broke out into a grin. "Well I'll be. You're, like, a natural! I'm super impressed."

"Thanks?" I squeaked, surprised and a bit unsettled at her sudden shift in tone.

"Sorry, sorry!" she chuckled. "Man, it was so weird to come in here, like, all serious and stern! Usually they get Minato to do this, but he's away at the moment."

"Uh..."

"I'm not making much sense, am I?" The woman rubbed the back of her head sheepishly.

"No. Not at all."

"Well, what I mean is that while I'm the village's best seal master, I'm not so good at the whole serious-stern-warning-lecture thing, yeah? My husband isn't as good as me, but they usually have him do it 'cause he's so much better at serious stuff. Now that I know you're not an idiot messing around with things you don't understand, I don't have to act all stuffy. Plus that teacher dude is gone." she explained. Surprised, I noticed she was right, at some point Isamu-sensei had left the room, and I hadn't even noticed.

"Oh... I see." I said, even though no, I did not see.

"Heh, anyways. The name is Uzumaki Kushina! It's a pleasure to meet you!"

"It's nice to meet you, Uzumaki-san. I'm Hoshino Sekai."

-x-

"How is Hoshino-chan progressing?" asked the head of the academy. He was a short, stocky man with wild black hair and blue eyes.

"Well in some regards, poorly in others." Kago answered, shifting through Sekai's file. He pulled out her score card. "As directed, during most lectures we let her focus on her own studies so long as she isn't disruptive. Academically she's at the top of the class. Her taijutsu, speed, strength and stamina have increased substantially—she's not quite top of the class in that aspect, but she's close. She's more than ready to move onto fourth year with the rest of the class. Wouldn't you agree, Hara?"

"Yeah, she's definitely going to be a taijutsu user. I expect she'll be top of the class by the time she graduates..." Isamu added with a nod.

"But?" the head prodded.

"She doesn't interact with her classmates at all, and struggles with ninjutsu—though we've only covered the transformation jutsu, which was noted as likely to be difficult for her due to her imbalance. I suspect she'll struggle less with the clone jutsu and replacement jutsu."

"Her ninjutsu struggles matter little—we were expecting that, and she'll never be a ninjutsu specialist. I'm more concerned about her relationship with her classmates." The academy head rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Why is it so poor? Is she hostile towards them?"

"She's not hostile towards them, sir." Kago began, hesitantly. "It would be more accurate to say that she is apathetic towards them. She's never outright said it, but it's fairly obvious she thinks they're stupid. I doubt she sees a point in spending time with them. As for how the other students view her..." The academy instructor sighed. "Their opinions vary. Most think she's creepy—she rarely shows any sort of expression and that's hard for them to process. Another common view is that she thinks she's better than everyone, and they're jealous of her."

"She kinda is..." Isamu muttered, only to receive a glare from Kago. "Hey, it's true. And if you think the whole lack of expression thing is creepy, it's even creepier when she _does_."

The academy head coughed to draw the attention of the instructors. "That will be a bit of a problem... Start to incorporate group work—perhaps an ongoing group research project?"

"Yes, sir." Kago nodded. "We'll come up with something."

"We both know I'll be the one coming up with the idea, bastard." Isamu muttered to himself.

"Anything else?" The head cut in before Kago could respond. "You say she's expected to excel in taijutsu? Any other expectations?"

"Genjutsu, obviously. We don't do much with it in the academy, but after she graduates she needs to receive instruction in it." Isamu answered promptly. "Also seals—she's mostly studying those during class."

"Good. Kago?"

"Nothing to add, sir." Kago replied.

"Moving on then, how about Yamanaka Aiko?"

-x-

Notes: Another chapter done. I passed out and fucked up my back when I fell, so I've been stuck in bed all week, unable to move much, and will have to get authorized withdrawals from my classes. So yet again, bad for me, good for you.

A wild Kushina appears! I decided to translate her verbal tic as "like" instead of "you know" because that's the translation I'm most familiar with, and feel works best for Kushina.

What do you think of my explanation for hand seals? To be honest it was a struggle to come up with an actual explanation for them—canon just seems to have decided "well, because it's cool" without any thought of how moving your hands around actually does anything.

Thank you all for the reviews, favourites and follows. I appreciate you all taking the time to read this.

Regards,

The Mathemagician


	6. Five

Against the World

"This village is full of lies, but then again, so am I."

-x-

They that you either die a hero, or live to become a monster.

To be honest, I thought of Hidden Leaf as a monster, for all the horrible things it does, for all the lies it tells, for pretending to be the good guys.

But then I realized that I do those horrible things, and I lie to everyone, every day, and I pretend I'm better than them, that _I'm_ good. So if Leaf is as much a monster I feel it is, then so am I.

It's funny though. I didn't live to become the monster, I died to.

-x-

Five

Uzumaki Kushina was an interesting woman, and aside from my mother and Hanako, the first person in this life I can say I genuinely like.

She was a bubbly, happy person and full of energy. I found it hard to believe she ever got tired. She was kind to me, and the way she answered the questions I asked of her that day proved that behind her cheerful exterior was a keen mind.

I was disappointed when Isamu-sensei returned to drag me back to class, but on the bright side it was almost worth it to see his furious expression when he realized that Kushina-sensei (as she insisted I call her) was laughing and joking around with me instead of giving me hell for my "reckless" actions.

I would have liked to see her again soon, but I wasn't holding out much hope.

-x-

Half way through March the new term began, and I became a fourth year student, along with most of my classmates.

The first day of term we went over the syllabus for the year, and it was interesting to note the differences between what we did in third year and what we'd be doing in the coming year.

In class book work was drastically cut back, but we would instead be working on a research project or something like that outside of class, details pending. To my displeasure, most of that time would instead be dedicated to ninjutsu, though I had made improvements on my transformation jutsu, and decided to cut out hand signs all together now that I knew they didn't actually do anything.

What surprised me most though, was the addition of a sex-segregated class once a week. It wasn't something I'd been expecting, and I couldn't help but feel equal parts curious and apprehensive.

Unlike classes in The Before, we didn't spend any time reviewing past material, but considering there was no break between terms, I suppose they didn't see much point.

Instead, as soon as Kago-sensei was finished with the syllabus, we dived head first into taijutsu practice again.

As soon as we reached the training field, Isamu-sensei pulled me away from my classmates.

"Okay, so. First of all, I want you to know I'll be pulling you aside a lot less year, Hoshino-chan. You've improved drastically, and there's no point in giving you private taijutsu lessons anymore. This is probably the last time. Instead, I'll probably be helping you with ninjutsu, since last term showed you struggle the most in that area. But for now, let's have one final spar, m'kay?"

"Yes, sensei." I nodded and shifted into my taijutsu stance. "Ready when you are."

"Well then, begin."

As soon as the words left his lip, I charged at him with my fist pulled back for a punch. Instead of punching him once I was in range, however, I dropped my arm and slipped around him to aim a kick at the back of his knee. He jumped off the ground to dodge, and I hurriedly backed away as he sent a kick of his own towards me.

I wasn't quite quick enough and took a glancing blow that knocked me off balance, and prevented me from dodging the punch that followed. I grunted at the impact, but took the opportunity to grab his arm. I pulled myself off the ground and delivered a double footed kick to his stomach.

I let go of his arm and he doubled over. I took the opportunity to kick at his face, but he grabbed my foot and threw me across the training field. I hit the ground and rolled back to my feet, charging at my sensei once more.

Back and forth we went, for the next hour. I got in a few solid hits, but for each hit I made, I received two more in return.

I grew frustrated, and finally decided that fuck it, it was time to play dirty, and as soon as I got an opening, I kicked him in the groin as hard as I could.

"What the hell, Hoshino!?" He groaned, bent over defensively.

"I think that's my win." I smirked.

"Bloody hell, kid. Not cool. That's a dirty move."

"A dirty move that could save my life in the field." I retorted.

"Fucking brat." he hissed. "Go back to your class. And for the record, you are not to intentionally do this in a spar with me or any of your classmates again, got it?"

"Fine." I crossed my arms and bit back a scowl. What a fucking pansy...

-x-

At the end of the week we had our first girls-only class. An older woman with salt and pepper hair was the teacher, and instead of using one of the classrooms, she led us out of the academy to a field of flowers and had us sit in a circle.

"Hello everyone," she said. "I'm Sarutobi Haruka. You may call me he Haruka-sensei. I'm here to talk to you girls about the unique challenges you will face as ninja, compared to your male counterparts.

"In times of peace, you would have had these lessons throughout all four years, however I'm afraid we don't have that luxury. If we did, we would spend time learning many non-combative skills that are useful for female ninja to know for espionage purposes, as that used to be our traditional role. I like to keep these lessons as informal as possible. Don't think of this as a class, think of it as a gathering of girls and women to share our experiences and wisdom. Any questions?"

I raised my hand, and she motioned for me to speak. "What sort of skills?"

"Nothing terribly exciting, I'm afraid. Things like dancing, sewing and other needlework, cooking, and flower arranging." she smiled wryly.

"Why?" I asked. It sounded like a complete waste of time.

"As I said, women used to primarily be spies. We would often have to disguise ourselves as servants, geisha, and noble women, so it was important to be able to blend in and have skills fitting for the role we posed as." Haruka-sensei explained patiently. It was obvious she was used to that sort of question.

"So what will we be doing instead?" The girl I was pretty sure was a Yamanaka asked, adjusting her blue, thick-rimmed glasses. (Akira or something? Aika?)

"First of all, we will discuss the ways our female biology can affect our careers. Does anyone have any idea how?"

"Um, we're usually smaller than boys?" one girl suggested.

Sensei hummed. "That's one way. Anyone else?"

A few other girls made some suggestions, but I could tell it wasn't what Haruka-sensei was hoping for.

"There are significant differences in bone density, muscle mass and ability to build up muscle, hormone levels, and lung capacity. In addition, females menstruate, and I imagine that has a big impact on things." I pitched in, tapping my fingers on my knee.

"Excellent points, Sekai-chan." She smiled. "Are you studying to be a medic?"

"No, I don't think that path is for me. Why do you ask?"

"I see. It's just that most girls who have that level knowledge at this point tend to have an interest in medicine." she explained. "Now, your last point is the one I wanted to talk about today, as it is arguably the most important. Is anyone unfamiliar with what menstruation is?"

To my surprise, there were a couple of girls who didn't, so Haruka-sensei gave a quick overview of the female reproductive system.

"The reason I say this is the most important topic is because in the past it was the reason women primarily specialized in espionage. Your monthly bleeding can cause many difficulties in the field, especially if you're unprepared for it, or the mission lasts longer than expected. Many ninja, especially trackers, have a strong sense of smell for blood—it stands out to them among other scents. This makes female ninja experiencing their monthlies easier to track. Many women experience severe cramping, which for obvious reasons affects performance in the field. In addition, our chakra grows erratic, and many experience lower chakra levels." Haruka-sensei explained. "Espionage was an area where none of this mattered, as we were passing ourselves off as civilians for long periods of time.

"Even only thirty years ago, nearly three-quarters of female ninja were espionage specialists. The rest of them would eat a special plant every few months that prevented them from bleeding."

"If there was a way to stop it, why didn't more girls do that?" The probably-Yamanaka-maybe-Akira girl asked in confusion.

"Because in many cases it rendered women barren, unable to produce children, Aiko-chan." Sensei explained, which gave me the name of the blonde girl. Aiko, Akira... close enough. "Something that was unacceptable to many clans."

"What changed?" I asked. "Something safer was developed?"

"Correct. About thirty years ago Senju Tsunade developed a jutsu to halt the reproductive system without damaging it. At first this jutsu needed to be applied every few months, but over the decades it has been refined to the point that it only needs to be cast once. The only downside is one much first achieve menarche before the jutsu can be cast. Many of you will be sent out into the field beforehand, and need to learn what to do if it happens on a mission."

The lesson was actually fairly interesting. We were taught what herbs to take with us on missions that short term, would stop the bleeding without damaging our reproductive organs and how long they would work. She covered how long we could use each of them before we risked infertility. She taught how to prepare and store them properly, and those of us that had prepared it properly were allowed to keep them, and those who hadn't were given pre-prepared sachets. (I sealed mine inside the seal on my arm as soon as sensei okayed it.) She also taught us where the different plants grew all over the continent and where to find them if for some reason we didn't have any on hand.

After assigning us homework, which was to collect the correct herbs from the field after classes ended for the day and attempt to prepare them correctly on our own, Haruka-sensei dismissed us.

-x-

To say I was annoyed when I learned that the out of class research paper thing was supposed to be a group project was an understatement. I was _pissed_.

"...Group six will be Hoshino Sekai, Uchiha Katsuo, and Tominaga Taiki. Group seven..."

 _They put me with a Tominaga._ A fucking Tominaga. Who the fuck thought that was a good fucking idea? Then again, it's not like the instructors are familiar with my family history. I took a deep breath, and told myself that they probably didn't know what they did to my mom and Hanako, or that I might be an illegitimate Tominaga.

Maybe they would let me change groups.

"...And that's all. There will be no trading partners. You are going to be graduating in less than a year. You will have to work with people you don't get along with in the field, where it could be a matter of life and death." Kago-sensei lectured sternly. "Think of this as practice."

Or not. Fuck.

-x-

At the end of the day, Kago-sensei handed out the assignments and gave us five minutes to make plans with our group mates.

"Hello." The Tominaga said as I approached him and our Uchiha partner. From the way they'd been behaving, it was clear they were already friends. "You're Hoshino Sekai, correct?" I nodded. I'm Tominaga Taiki, and this is Uchiha Katsuo."

"Hn." The Uchiha grunted.

"Right well. We've been assigned Yanagikage Hibiki." Tominaga said, looking at the handout. "Apparently he made a name for himself in the second war."

"Anything else?" I asked.

"Nope. That's for us to find out, isn't it?"

"I'll see if any of the textbooks mention him." Uchiha volunteered.

"They don't."

"What?" The Uchiha boy, who's first name I'd already forgotten, narrowed his eyes.

"They don't." I repeated. "I've read all the textbooks. He was never mentioned once."

"Oh yeah?" he sneered. "You probably missed something, it's not like you memorized them all."

"Except I did. Not verbatim, but close enough."

"Please, as if—"

"Katsuo! Hoshino! Shut up." Tominaga interrupted. "Look, Hoshino, there's no harm in him double checking, okay?"

"It's a waste of time." I argued.

"Too fucking bad. Katsuo will look through the textbooks. I'll check my clan library for anything, and you can check yours, Hoshino."

"Are you stupid?" I snorted. "I'm an orphan. I have no clan."

"Fine." he snapped. "Then you check the textbooks again, and Katsuo can see what the Uchiha clan has."

I sneered. "I just told you I have them memorized and there's nothi—"

"Just do it, Hoshino!" Tominaga hissed. "Get off your high horse. Katsuo and me are the ones in charge here, okay? We're older and have more experience, so just do as we say!"

"And yet I'm smarter than both of you put together." I retorted. And older than the two of them put together as well, if you count my previous life.

The two boys traded a look and nodded. "Then write the paper yourself." They said in unison, and stalked off.

I was furious. They were clan brats, they could get away with skipping an assignment. Or more likely, they'd be able claim I refused to work with them, and hand in the paper with only their names on it.

Meanwhile, I'm fucked, because _there aren't any books available to me_. It really wasn't fair—clan kids obviously had an advantage.

It appeared I'd have to improvise.

-x-

"I know a bit about Yanagikage Hibiki." Hanako said with a secretive smile. "First of all, despite the name, she was a woman."

"What else can you tell me?"

"What do you want to know?"

It turns out asking Hanako was an excellent idea. Yanagikage Hibiki was born fifteen years after the founding of the village, died at the end of the second war, and was the first female ANBU captain.

"How do you know that?" I asked. That wasn't the sort of thing that was common knowledge.

"She was my captain." Hanako replied.

"You were ANBU?"

"Yes. In fact, the mission that crippled me, is the one that she died on. I was the only survivor."

I took notes as Hanako told me all about Yanagikage Hibiki, or at least, the stuff that was declassified.

"Is it really okay for me to put this all in my report?" I asked once Hanako finished.

She chuckled. "Of course it is, I'm the one who created the assignment."

"Wait, what?"

"Things like this are just one of the many jobs available to retired ninja, things that active ones don't have time for. For this assignment, myself and a few others chose the ninja each group was to collect information about based on who they know. Each group has at least one person who knows someone that can give them detailed information."

"Isn't it not fair for you to have answered my questions in this case, though? Since you made the assignment?" I inquired.

"It's fair because I didn't volunteer the information," Hanako replied. "You _asked._ "

-x-

My group mates were clearly unsuccessful in their search for information on our target, judging by their behaviour on the day the report was due.

Since the Uchiha and Tominaga boys were sitting up front, Kago-sensei asked them for the paper first. I was delighted to see their embarrassment and frustration as they admitted that they couldn't find any information on our target.

By the time Kago-sensei got to my row, I was cackling with glee. Well, on the inside, at least.

"Kago-sensei..." I said as I innocently widened my eyes. "Uchiha-kun and Tominaga-kun refused to work with me, therefore I wrote the paper on my own. Is that acceptable?"

"That's fine." Kago-sensei replied with a wry smile. "We were expecting things like this to happen."

After collecting all the assignments, he walked back to the front of the classroom, dumped them on his desk, and crossed his arms. "Okay everyone. Raise your hand if you wrote a report alone."

I looked around curiously as I raised my hand. About an eighth of us had our hands up, and I noticed most, if not all, of us lacked a clan.

"Now, everyone who were unable to write anything, raise your hands." Nearly a quarter of the class raised their hands. "Starting from my right, if you didn't write anything, explain why. Uchiha-kun, you're up."

"Ah, well, Taiki and I checked our clan libraries and academy textbooks, but there was nothing about the guy we were looking for. Or if there was, we didn't find it in time..." My former group mate explained.

The rest of my classmates in same boat as him gave similar answers. Once they had all given their excuses, Kago-sensei spoke. "You failed because the ninja you were to research were intentionally chosen so that there were few, if any, actual documents relating to them."

"But then how were we supposed to do the damn thing?" An Inuzuka boy protested.

"You were supposed to ask people." I spoke up.

"Exactly." Kago-sensei agreed. "This was information gathering, not researching. The best way to get information that's not publicly available is to talk to people. I'm sure those of you who wrote their reports were handed the information as soon as they ask. Next time, this will not be so.

"That said, the second purpose of this assignment was to make you understand that those of you who come from ninja clans and families aren't better than those who don't. Every single one of you who handed in a paper by yourselves aren't from clans, and most of you who handed in nothing are from clans.

"Let that sink in."

-x-

On the Wednesday after we the first group project was due, we were given a second—and more interesting—one, in my opinion.

We were broken up into groups of three again. This time I was partnered with Yamanaka Aiko and some Aburame kid, in Team Twelve. We were given a list of genin who would be wearing red, numbered arm bands around the village, and the times they would be available over the next two weeks. They were our informants. Our job was track them down and find out what they know.

Unfortunately, however, some of our informants had turned traitor. Loyal informants will always tell the truth, and traitors will always lie. ( _Don't you just_ love _the insinuation that traitors always lie, and loyal ninja always tell the truth?_ _That anything a traitor says against the village is false, that their legitimate issues with the village are_ _just a fabrication_ _?_ ) Our job was to figure out who the traitors were.

We were given ten tokens. For any question regarding other informants, it cost us one token. Once we figured out who was lying and telling the truth, we were supposed to write a paper detailing the correct intel that we gathered from the genin.

While I wasn't exactly excited about working with two little kids again, at least the actual task was interesting.

"Hey, Sekai-chan! Shinji-kun! Over here!" Yamanaka Aiko called from the doorway just after the start of lunch. "Let's eat outside and talk about the assignment."

"Very well." Shinji the Aburame kid agreed, inclining his head.

With a small sigh, I got up from my seat and followed Aburame and Aiko outside. The blonde led us over to the tree I'd been sitting in when she and her friends had been gossiping about me the year before.

"Right, so what's the best way to go about looking for these people?" Aiko said, gesturing to the handout.

"Leave that to me." Aburame said as he lifted his hand, showing us some sort of bug, and then a couple more came out of his sleeve to crawl along his hand.

"Is there a reason you're showing us a bug?" Aiko asked, pushing her glasses up.

"It is a _kikaichu,_ not a _bug_. My clan has a symbiotic relationship with them—they live in our bodies, and in turn we can control them and put them to use for various tasks. They can search the village for our targets and track them once they're found."

Jesus fucking Christ. That's...

"If you ever put a bug on me I will end you, and your bugs too." I stated blandly. The Aburame kid, who I decided would be Bug Boy from then on, turned to face me. I assumed he was staring at me, but he was wearing sunglasses so I wasn't quite sure.

"Sekai-chan!" Aiko hissed at me. "That's not a nice thing to say."

I gave her a blank stare, and she averted her eyes. "Yes well, bugs aren't nice either." I gave a small shrug. "Moving on, can your bugs find these people based on just a name?"

"My _kikaichu_ cannot find someone unless I'm able to give them a description."

"So we need to gather intelligence beforehand, then." I said. "Any ideas? Would "red arm band" be enough for the bugs?"

"Unfortunately my _**kikaichu**_ have poor red vision." Does he not realize that the more emphasis he put on the word kikaichu, the less likely I am to use it?

"Intelligence is my clan's specialty. I'll ask some of my cousins, see if they can give any descriptions." Aiko volunteered.

"Then I will write the report and figure out who the traitors are." Because I hardly trusted that those two could do it right. "We'll meet up after school everyday and reevaluate our next move."

With that, I turned my back on Bug Boy and Aiko, and took off for the orphanage.

The first thing I did when I got back was take a shower and make sure there weren't any bugs on me anywhere.

As I scrubbed away at my skin, all I could think was thank fuck I wasn't born into that clan.

-x-

"I have descriptions of five of them." Aiko announced on Friday as she pulled a folder from her backpack and flipped it open. "And I got pictures of two of those five."

Bug Boy took the photos from Aiko, studied them a bit, then passed them to me. I took a quick look, then passed them back to Aiko to trade for one of the descriptions of the remaining targets.

"I'll send my kikaichu out to search for them, and to tag them if they're found outside of their availability."

"Wait." I ordered. "Did you find anything about where they tend to spend their time? I'd assume they wouldn't change things up just to make it harder for us—they'll probably just do what they'd normally do, but get paid for it." Or at least that's what I would do.

"Yeah, Number One likes to hang out at the Amaguriama on Tea Avenue. Number Five likes to spend time at the hot springs, and Number Ten spends a lot of time in the library." Aiko recounted.

"The three of us will go to Amaguriama first, while Bu—" catching myself, I faked a cough to cover up the fact that I almost called him Bug Boy aloud. "Apologies, I must be coming down with something. Aburame can send some bugs—" " _ **Kikaichu!**_ " Bug Boy hissed. "Right. You can send bugs to the other two locations to keep an eye out, and then some others around the village in general." Finished giving orders, I started running towards Tea Avenue. It wasn't far from the academy, it was just across the river, in the merchant district near the south gate.

"S-slow down, Sekai-chan!" Aiko hollered, prompting me to look back. Seeing the other two were nearly half a block behind me, I stopped to let them catch up. "You're really fast, Sekai-chan." Aiko commented, and I gave a small shrug of my left shoulder, then continued on at a slower pace.

Once we reached Tea Avenue, I slowed down to a leisurely stroll, and started to pay more attention to the people around me.

"Over there!" Aiko discreetly pointed to a pair of genin sitting on a bench just outside the entrance to one of the play parks. I nodded, and headed over there.

"Excuse us, senpai. We were wondering if we could have a moment of your time?"

One sighed. "What team are you?"

"Twelve."

"Alright. Here's what I know..." While One shared his intel, Bug Boy took notes and Aiko and I watched him for any signs of dishonesty.

Once he was finished, I handed over one of the tokens.

"At least one of Numbers Two, Three, and Four are traitors."

-x-

Over the next week, we managed to find Five, Seven, Nine and Ten. With only a few days left, I made the decision to just ask some of the ones we'd already found (and tagged with Bug Boy's creepy crawlies).

Aiko managed to suss out that Number One was almost certainly one of the loyal informants, so we used most of our tokens on him.

After using our last token, we had the following statements:

One:

At least one of Numbers Two, Three, and Four are traitors.

Six is a traitor.

Nine is a traitor

Twelve would say "Two Six, and Twelve are loyal."

Five:

Six is a traitor.

Three is loyal.

Seven:

Eight is a traitor.

Nine:

Four would say "Five and Eleven are traitors."

Ten:

Eleven is a traitor.

Seven is a traitor and Eleven loyal.

Starting with Number Ten's contradiction, it was easy to see that Eleven was loyal, and so was Seven, which meant that Eight was a traitor.

If One is Loyal, then Six and Nine are traitors, from which we get that Four and Five are loyal. Since Five is loyal, so is Three. Four and Three being loyal means that Two has to be a traitor. And finally, if Two is a traitor, then so is Twelve.

"I need the intel from Eleven, Seven, One, Four, Five, and Three." I said as we were leaving the hot springs after using our last token on Number Five.

"Wait, what?" Aiko said skeptically. "You mean you figured it out already?"

"Yes. It wasn't like it was difficult. It was a simple logic problem."

"Are you certain?" Bug Boy asked. "I find it hard to believe that you worked it out so quickly."

"Well, I find it hard to believe you can function with half a brain." I deadpanned, causing Aiko to let out a snort of laughter. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a report to write."

-x-

Notes: from last chapter niNRG brand is to be read "nin-R-G", a pun on energy. Also, don't forget the sekai-against-the-world tumblr. It's basically the databook for the fic.

The second group project is based on a logic puzzle I got from a generator.

I find myself looking up the weirdest things for this fic, I tell you. Did you know insects with compound eyes have poor red vision? Also someone should write a short self-insert horror story where the character is reborn into the Aburame clan, but carries their entomophobia (fear of bugs) from their previous life over.

In regards to names and honorifics. Hoshino is the family name, Sekai is her given name. In Japan it is common to refer to someone only by their last name, which is what most people do when speaking to Sekai. Aiko calling her "Sekai-chan" is being slightly overly familiar. Tbh the way honorifics are used in Naruto confuses the fuck out of me, so I'm just going with the way I learned they were used.

Sorry for the delay. I've mostly been working on scenes that will come up in the future, and even wrote the epilogue.

I intended this to be the last academy chapter, but it looks like the next one will be.

Thank you all for the reviews, favourites, and follows!

The Mathemagician


	7. Six

Against The World

"I couldn't help but wonder, why me?"

-x-

"Anything new to report on Interest 07-606?"

"Its chakra... I think there's something wrong with it." The Eye answered. "I've never felt something like that before."

"Hm..."

-x-

Six

After turning in the report, I expected that would be the last of my interactions with Aiko and Bug Boy, but it seemed I was half wrong. While Bug Boy clearly didn't like me (probably because of the things I said to him), Aiko seemed to enjoy my company, and sought me out at lunch.

"Sekai-chan! Let's eat outside, okay?" I stared at her a bit, wondering why the hell she expected me to eat with her, but eventually followed her out of curiosity.

"Why?" I asked her as we sat down underneath a tree.

"Why what?"

I stared at her for a moment, then clarified. "Why do you wish to eat with me?"

She blinked, and adjusted her glasses. "Because I enjoyed spending time with you while we worked together."

"Really."

"Yes, really!" she affirmed.

"I find that hard to believe, considering last year you were gossiping about me getting special treatment and even suggested I was, I quote, "the secret love child of some super important ninja.""

Aiko blushed. "How did you hear that?" Instead of responding verbally, I jumped up into the tree, settling on one of the branches.

"Oh. You were in the tree..." she mumbled, more to herself than to me. I jumped down from the tree and landed in a crouch. I straightened up to my full height, though that wasn't saying much. I'd barely grown at all since I entered the academy.

"I'm sorry!" she apologized, her face red. "I..." she took a deep breath. "I'm a Yamanaka. We're encouraged to gossip. Gossip is a good way to gather and spread information, or misinformation. It's considered training. I don't even talk to those girls anymore—they were just convenient, but they stopped saying anything new after awhile."

I nodded, accepting her explanation, then sat back down to finish my lunch with her. I didn't say much as we ate, but I listened to her talk instead, occasionally nodding or shaking my head. By the time lunch ended, I learned that her favourite colour was bright blue, she was an only child, her mother was a Yamanaka, but her father married into the clan, and both her parents were special jounin.

When class resumed, she stole the seat next to me from the person who usually sat there. It was quite funny watching the boy try to make her move, to no avail. It appeared Aiko was very stubborn.

The period after lunch was generally reserved for lectures, so when Kago-sensei started droning on about something I already knew from the textbooks, I pulled out some paper, a pencil, and the latest scroll I'd received courtesy of Kushina-sensei and Hanako, for reference.

That day I was planning to sketch out a few possibilities for securing the seals on my body so that only I could open them.

After double checking the scroll to see what it said about different ways to secure a seal, I decided to start out with my functional seals as a base and add on security measures. On my first draft, I added characters for chakra and lock, which were connected with a thick line to the top of the seal, where it would be easiest to incorporate into the existing seal. The downside was that this unbalanced the seal, so I needed to add something to rebalance it. Unfortunately, that was easier said than done. I considered adding a blood lock component to the seal, but if I did two different things at once, then it would be harder to figure out where I messed up when testing.(Because at this stage, mistakes are inevitable. Only true masters were able to create new seals on the fly. I hoped I would make it to that point, someday.)

Frustrated, I discarded my first attempt, and started again. This time I drew the basic outline for the seal again, but left off all the kanji. This way I could rearrange things to fit in the new feature without completely unbalancing it. Once pleased with the placements, I tucked the paper into my bag. Then, I sketched out two more seal bases. On the first, rearranged the kanji another way from my previous attempt. For the second seal base, I changed some of the kanji. There were so many different characters that had similar, but not exactly the same, meanings.

Before I began to sketch out another base, I felt someone poke my arm. Turning my head away from my work, I saw that it was Aiko who had disturbed me. Once she managed to catch my attention, she slid a piece of paper closer to me, and pointed.

' _What are you doing?_ ' it said.

I pulled the paper over and wrote a quick reply. ' _Trying to alter one of my seals._ '

' _Shouldn't you be paying attention, though?_ ' she asked.

' _I already know the things he'_ _s talking about._ ' I wrote. ' _I almost never pay attention, unless it's something not covered in the textbooks._ '

' _And you don't get in trouble?_ '

' _No. Studying something else is what they want me to do._ '

' _Why?_ '

' _Because if my physical scores weren't so low,_ _well that's an understatement. If they weren't abysmal_ _on the entrance tests, they would have given me a forehead protector then and there._ ' I explained.

Instead of responding, Aiko turned her head to stare at me in disbelief. The light shined off her glasses, obscuring her eyes, but judging by the rest of her face, they were probably widened in surprise.

-x-

We had a girls-only lesson again later that day, and once Haruka-sensei dismissed us, I waited around until my classmates were gone.

"Is there something you need, Sekai-chan?" She asked.

I nodded. "I'm planning to visit my mother's grave today. And the daughter of my obaa-san's too. I was wondering if it was acceptable to take some flowers from the field, and if you're willing to tell me which ones are appropriate?"

Haruka-sensei's already kind expression softened further. "Of course."

With her help, I made a simple bouquet for my mother. Sweet peas for goodbye, a white chrysanthemum for grief, aster for remembrance, and white lilies for purity. I didn't arrange it to look nice and fancy or anything like that. I told Haruka-sensei what I wanted the flowers to mean, and she gave me suggestions.

For Hanako's daughter, I opted to just take a chrysanthemum and a white lily, since I never met her. But Hanako was unable to make it to her grave, so I decided to do it for her. After everything she's done for me and mother, it was the least I could do.

After thanking Haruka-sensei, I made my way to the graveyard. When I arrived, I decided to go to my mother's grave first. Her grave wasn't hers alone. Mother's name was one of many on a large headstone, with her birth and death dates written in tiny lettering just under her name. This massive headstone was for civilians who were unable to pay for a whole plot to themselves.

When I came to it, I noticed that someone else must have been there fairly recently, as there weren't any weeds to pull. I took a wet cloth and cleaned the stone, wiping away a small amount dust and grime. With that complete, I placed the flowers in front of it.

Part of me wanted to talk to the grave, but I was well aware it wouldn't reach her, so what was the point? I couldn't help but believe all the fuss about funerals and graves is pointless, and just for living. Regardless, I sat at her grave for nearly an hour before making my way to the ninja cemetery.

Most ninja clans had their own private cemeteries on their own land, but the ninja cemetery is for those not born of a clan.

The ninja graveyard was larger than the civilian one, and almost all of the ninja had there own headstone for themselves and immediate family.

I walked along the rows, looking for Hanako's daughter. I'd never been there before, so I wasn't sure where it would be, but on the sixth row, I found it.

Unlike mother's grave, this grave was dirty and crawling with weeds. I plucked them out, and then cleaned the headstone. I set the two flowers before the grave, and started to stand up when I paused and looked at the dates.

Hanako told me she was seventeen when she was cast out of the Tominaga clan for falling pregnant with an enemy's child. But from the date on the headstone, her daughter wasn't born until she was twenty-three.

Which left me with many questions.

Why did she lie?

If her daughter was born years after she was disinherited, what did she do to be cast out?

She claimed the reason she helped mother was because she'd been in mother's place before. But she hadn't been. So what were her real motives for taking mother in?

A cold, heavy weight settled in my chest. The one person, besides my mother, in this life that I fully trusted was lying to me.

I didn't know what to do.

When I visited Hanako the next day, I told her I had brought flowers to her daughter's grave.

I didn't tell her what I discovered.

She teared up when I told her, and pulled me close in a tearful embrace. I gently returned it, even though her hand on my back felt like a knife.

-x-

"Alright class," Kago-sensei bellowed over the chatter of my classmates. "I have an announcement to make today before we start class.

"I have booked training ground fifty-six for three days next week. We will be having a survival exercise. Please inform your parents about the exercise. The trip is compulsory. Isamu-sensei has a hand out with some tips for packing for this." Kago-sensei said, while Isamu-sensei started handing out the papers. "Now, for this trip, everyone will have a partner." Groans filled the room. Nobody wanted another assigned partner. "Quit your whining." sensei barked. "You lot can pick your own partners this time. There is an even number of you. If you have trouble finding a partner, stay behind after class and we'll figure things out from there. Additionally, though the training ground is outside the walls, there will be many ninja patrolling it to keep you safe."

Aiko poked me to get my attention. "Hey, you want to be partners?" I nodded. She was probably the best potential partner of the lot. She wasn't a complete idiot, and in the time I've spent with her, I had to admit I'd become rather fond of her. "Great!"

It took the instructors a moment to settle the class down for the lecture, but when it started, I was sure my classmates were paying no more attention than I ever did.

With the interesting bit over, I got back to work on my seals until it was time for ninjutsu.

Isamu-sensei sensei pulled me aside again. While I hadn't quite mastered the transformation jutsu, I had been improving with his help. At this point, I was able to transform into someone of similar height without messing anything up. Unfortunately, I was still unable to transform into someone larger.

"Alright, Hoshino-chan," Isamu-sensei said. "We've probably got as good at the transformation jutsu as you'll get with your skewed chakra. At the very least you can alter your appearance if you can't be seen as yourself for whatever reason." Sensei sighed. "To tell the truth, we weren't really expecting you to manage that much."

My lips thinned at his words. I was not happy that everyone assumed I would completely fail at something. Which meant I had to prove them wrong.

"Today I'm going to teach you the clone jutsu." He raised his hands and formed the hand seals a bit slower than typical to allow me to follow easily—ram, snake, tiger. With a poof of smoke three copies of my instructor appeared around him. "Try it yourself."

I nodded, and formed the hand signs even though I didn't need them. After all, if people knew I didn't need them, then it wouldn't be as effective. My chakra responded to my commands as easily as walking and four clones poofed into existence. Isamu-sensei's eyebrows shot up his forehead.

"Well, looks like you've got that one down." He commented. "I don't think I know of anyone who managed it on the first try before." I stared at him in response. "I guess it's time to teach you the substitution jutsu..."

I watched his hands move, tiger, boar, ox, dog, and snake. With a poof of smoke, sensei was replaced with a pencil. I turned around and found Isamu-sensei crouched on the desk.

Before he could say anything, I tried the jutsu myself. I intended to swap places with the pencil on the floor in front of me, but only managed to bring the pencil over to where I stood.

While that wasn't what the jutsu was supposed to it, I filed it away in my head to experiment with later. Being able to get something without coming close to it could be _very_ useful.

-x-

The days leading up to the survival training passed quickly. In an act of generosity, I gave Aiko a storage seal to pack her things in.

The list had some useful advice—don't pack anything too heavy or bulky, a single change of clothes is good enough, bring a canteen, blah, blah, blah. It warned against bringing too much food, as it tended to be heavy and took up a lot of room, and it was generally possible to catch food as you travelled.

I, of course, ignored most of the suggestions, and packed in as many niNRG bars I could sneak from the kitchen, along with some instant ramen and rice into my storage seal. I packed two changes of clothes, a fuck ton of water, a bedroll, a stolen tarp and rope, a lighter, bandages, rubbing alcohol, and anything else I could think of.

Even though I was only going for three days, I had enough food to last me a month, if you counted the meal replacement bars.

When I reached the academy the day of the trip, I couldn't help but cackle (on the inside, of course) upon seeing my classmates. Most seemed to have packed more than they should have—some of their back packs were bursting with clothes and bed rolls, and others had sharp, hard corners threatening to rip the fabric.

My classmates gave me strange looks upon arrival, as to them it looked like I hadn't packed anything but the kunai I signed out for the trip in my weapon pouch.

When Aiko arrived, I saw that she was as bagless as me. It seemed she made good use of the storage seal I gave her.

At Oh-nine-hundred hours, we left the academy. There wasn't much talking on the run out of the south gate and into the surrounding woods. It was my first time outside of the village gates, though the land itself was technically part of the village.

Kago-sensei stopped abruptly in a small clearing, and the kid behind him almost ran into him, but sensei side stepped him and the kid fell flat on his face.

Sensei sighed, giving the kid a disappointed look. "All right everyone. Get into your pairs." Most of the students were already near their partner, but the others quickly paired up. "Your main task for today is to build yourselves a shelter to sleep in the next two nights. You may ask Isamu-sensei or I for guidance, but we will not be building them for you. Your shelter must be constructed no more than half a kilometre away from this point. If you don't manage it by nightfall, tough luck. If you hear this bell," Kago-sensei held up the bell and purposely rang it. I noticed it seemed unnaturally loud. "Then you come back to the clearing. Now get to it."

I glanced at Aiko, and she nodded. The two of us walked through the woods, looking for a good spot but not wandering too far. We stopped when we saw a pair of trees that had low branches that were nearly touching.

"I have a tarp and rope." I said. "We could balance the tarp on those two branches and tie it down."

"Good idea. I have some rope, too. And some kunai." my partner agreed.

We both unsealed our supplies, and got to work. I threaded the rope into the holes at the sides of the tarps, then climbed one of the trees and draped the tarp over the tree branches and secured it with a bit of rope. With that taken care of, I jumped down to help Aiko tie the ropes to her four kunai that were stuck in the ground. All in all, it didn't take us long, maybe a half hour including the time we searched for a good spot, and left us wondering what we were supposed to do.

With a shrug, we opted to head back to the clearing where

we'd stopped earlier.

"Having problems?" Isamu-sensei asked as we stepped into the clearing.

"No. We've finished out shelter and were wondering what we were supposed to do now." Aiko explained.

"Done already?" he said. "Let's see it."

To say Isamu-sensei was pleased with what we'd accomplished would be a lie. Apparently we weren't supposed to use the things we brought with us. Or rather, things that without our storage seals, we would be unable to take with us.

He tried to give us some lecture about not always having these sorts of supplies with you, even if you have a storage seal, as you might be separated from it. Upon hearing that, I looked him dead in the eye, pushed up my left sleeve, unsealed my canteen, and took a long drink from it.

-x-

For the first day, the academy instructors showed us how to catch the local wild life for dinner. They demonstrated how make a good snare, how to clean the game once caught, and how to cook it.

I watched in mute horror as they caught squirrels and bunnies, and then brutally murdered them.

"You okay, Sekai-chan?" Aiko asked, seeming to sense something was off despite my lack of expression.

"They killed squirrels and bunnies." I mumbled. She gave me a strange look, and I felt compelled to explain. Or at least partially explain. "I am... quite fond of squirrels and bunnies. I'd rather kill and eat that annoying Tominaga boy than squirrels or bunnies."

"...Really? You're serious?" she asked in disbelief.

"Completely." I shrugged. It wasn't like I could explain that in my previous life I'd had a pet bunny, and fond memories of trying to catch squirrels so I could pet them when I was a kid. Those were some of my stronger memories that weren't information based. "If you partake in the consumption of such pure creatures, I will never speak to you again."

"Well, then what are we supposed to eat?" she asked with raised eyebrows. In response I unsealed two cups of instant ramen and two niNRG bars. "Alright. Sounds like a plan. No squirrels or bunnies for us."

I smiled. "Thank you."

"O-of course!" she stuttered. "I think this is the first time I've seen you smile."

"I suggest you don't get used to it."

She snorted, trying to hold back a laugh. "You know, Sekai-chan, you're really funny. I mean, you can be a bit mean, like you were with Shinji-kun, but it's still funny. Especially since you say things with such a straight face and serious tone."

"Of course. I'm hilarious." I paused for a moment in confusion. "Who is this Shinji-kun person?"

-x-

Like with the shelter, our instructors weren't happy about our refusal to eat bunnies and squirrels, and gave me a look of pure disbelief. I supposed I didn't seem the sort to have issues with that. This time though, they didn't seem surprised that I had brought things that would normally not fit well in a mission pack.

Regardless, the incident with the shelter and the refusal to eat what the instructors caught seemed to set the tone for the rest of the trip. Repeatedly, Aiko and I did things our own way, and there really wasn't much they could do to us, since we weren't breaking the letter of the rules, just the spirit of them.

By the end of the trip, it was clear Kago-sensei and Isamu-sensei were happy to no longer have to deal with us.

After the trip, the last couple of months of the term seemed to fly by faster than usual. Perhaps it was because I had a friend to train and spend time with that made things go by quicker, but in the end it didn't matter. Soon enough, it was a week before the graduation exam and time for the pre-graduation medical exam.

A different doctor or medic or whatever gave the exam, rather than that rude blonde lady. This new guy was older than the woman, with grey hair and wrinkly hands. I decided to call him Doctor Geezer.

He went through similar motions to the previous exam. I was weighed and measured, I channelled my chakra into a paper, blood was taken, and so on.

When everything was processed, Doctor Geezer discussed the results with me. Apparently I'd only grown roughly five centimetres since my pre-academy exam. Which wasn't exactly normal, he said, but not something that would stop me from becoming a ninja. My chakra ratio had improved at least, if only barely. It was no long split seven to ninety three, but instead seven _point five_ to ninety two point five. Much progress. Very difference. Many progress.

To my relief, I was given the go ahead to take the graduation exam.

-x-

The week leading up to the exam was spent training with Aiko and helping her study. She sparred with me, and helped me test out my seals. In return, I quizzed her on the ninja rules and other dull, but apparently important information.

The day of the exam the two of us met up early. Aiko seemed to be a bit anxious about the exam, but I wasn't worried about either of us passing. Aiko wasn't the best at taijutsu, but she was no slouch either. She excelled at ninjutsu, and was one of the best when it came to theoretical aspects. Still, it didn't seem to matter to her that she was more than ready for the exam, so I suggested meeting up early so I could give her a bit of a pep talk.

"You're not an idiot, like the rest of the class. You'll pass."...Or as close to a pep talk as I could get. Still, making the effort to help her seemed to clam her down a little.

"That's not really inspiring, but thanks." She told me with a lopsided grin.

I did my best to distract her from worrying about the impending exam, and it seemed to work. I didn't do much, I just asked her a question and let her talk until she had nothing more to say on the topic, and then asked another one. By the time we took our seats for the written portion, she was much more relaxed.

On all the desks in the classroom, was a thick exam turned over. A few students tried to peek at it before the test actually started, but were quickly reprimanded by Kago-sensei, who threatened to fail them then and there if they tried again.

Finally, when the minute hand on the clock moved to the twelve, Kago-sensei had us start.

Without further ado, I turned the exam over, wrote my name on the top, and got to work. I flipped through the pages to see what all they were testing us on, and after checking each page, I decided to start with the math section.

Unlike the first exam I wrote, all the math was very basic, so I finished the section quickly. Next, I flipped to the geography section, where I labelled a map and answered general questions about Fire country. I breezed through history and regurgitated the ninja rules they asked for. Chakra theory involved a bit of thought, but not much. Standard procedures and conduct were covered, but the longest portion was the scenario questions. Unlike the entrance exam, they weren't really vague and didn't take too much thought.

Finished, I turned my paper over as directed on the last page, and rested my chin on the desk. For the next two hours I sat there doing nothing but tapping my fingers against my knees and attempting to avoid death by boredom.

We had two and a half hours for the exam, but I finished just after the thirty minute mark. The next person to finish was done two hours in. (It was Aiko who finished second, which pleased me.) By the end of the allotted time, only a third of the students had even finished the exam.

After that they tested our proficiency with kunai and shuriken, and then had us run the obstacle course and spar with each other. The last part of the exam was the ninjutsu portion. Thankfully, they didn't ask me to do the transformation jutsu, and instead asked for me to make a few clones. After dispelling them, I was handed a forehead protector and congratulated on becoming a genin of Hidden Leaf.

Curious, I asked them whether they had even graded the exam papers, and was told that they were graded by a group of chuunin while we underwent the physical tests.

With that answered, I thanked them and walked down the halls to the exit. I stepped outside and took a deep breath.

I was a ninja.

-x-

"How are team placements coming along this year, gentlemen?" The Fourth Hokage asked the chuunin in front of him.

"Well, this is the year for the new team dynamic trial run, correct?" Isamu asked. "Then for those... twelve, was it?" The Hokage nodded. "Has it been decided which students have been selected?"

"To a degree. There are a couple that have yet to be finalized, but these nine here," Dan said, holding out a piece of paper. "Are what we've decided on at this point."

Isamu took the paper and held it between himself and Kago so they could both see the names on the list.

"Any suggestions for team formations among them?"

"Well, I think it would be best if Yamanaka Aiko and Hoshino Sekai are put together." Kago said. "Yamanaka-chan is the only one Hoshino-chan has any attachment to, and even then it took quite awhile for that bond to grow. Splitting them up at this point would lead to them drifting apart."

"Yes, that would be best. Hoshino-chan has few ties to the village, it would be foolish to break one." Dan agreed. "And for the third teammate?"

"I don't have anyone specific in mind, but it would be better to place someone who's intellectually equal to Yamanaka-chan, at the very least. Hoshino-chan has no patience for idiocy."

"Hm... There's a girl a year behind your class." Dan started, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "There were plans to place her in the new program when she graduates—the girl is highly intelligent, though not comparable to Hoshino-chan. She might be a good fit. I'll speak to the year three instructors about possible early graduation."

-x-

Notes: Don't expect all updates to be this quick! But I've had time and I have been really inspired.

Someone asked about pairings and if there would be fem slash. At this point, I haven't even considered any pairings for Sekai. The focus of this story won't be romance. _However_ I do plan to have at least one f/f relationship, but as of yet not for Sekai.

The next chapter is an interlude, and was written prior to this chapter, with the plan to post them together. It should clear up confusion about the timeline.

Thank you all for the support,

The Mathemagician


	8. i

Against the World

"The soil of the world is soaked in blood."

-x-

Many felt there was barely a pause between the second and third war, and on top of that the third went twice as long as the other two before it.

It seems the fourth was destined to surpass it in all ways.

-x-

i

(The Square Root of Negative One)

The fourth war officially commenced nine years after the end of the third, shortly after the death of my mother, but everyone knew it was coming for years beforehand.

It started with a peace treaty, not even half a decade after the end of the third war. While the war was officially over at that time, the purpose of the treaty was to ensure the continuation of the non-aggression policy between the Village Hidden in the Leaves and the Village Hidden in Clouds.

At least that was the pretense. In truth, Cloud proposed the treaty in order to gain entrance to Leaf, to attempt to steal the Byakugan.

The details of what actually happened are up for debate, and I'm not too clear on them, even now, but what is known is that the head ninja from Cloud attempted to kidnap the Hyuuga heiress, but was caught in the act, and as a result of the ensuing scuffle, both the head ninja and the heiress were killed.

Cloud claims that it was obviously a misunderstanding, the head ninja was surely not attempting to kidnap the girl, perhaps she'd just wandered out and he was returning her home, and the hasty actions of the Leaf ninja are what resulted in the death of the heiress and the head ninja. As such, Cloud felt that Leaf was responsible for the unjustified death of their ambassador and owed them reparations.

What Cloud didn't know was that their head ninja didn't die in the ensuing skirmish, but shortly afterwards—by which point Leaf already had a Yamanaka read his memories, and as a result Leaf knew for certain that the peace treaty was a pretense for bloodline theft from the very beginning. Unfortunately, the Yamanaka's jutsu put too much stress on the injured ambassador, which is what killed him. Leaf couldn't admit to essentially killing the head ninja outside of battle, however, as it violated accords signed to end the third war and would reflect poorly upon them.

It was a messy situation, all around. Not that I remember it of course, I was only a year old at the time.

The head of the Hyuuga clan was up in arms—his heiress, his _daughter_ , had been killed in an attempt at bloodline theft, and he was adamant Cloud had to pay. The other clans rallied around him, thoughts and fears of ' _it could have been us_ ' racing in their minds.

Things were tense, neither side ready to give in, and since it was just a few short years since the end of the third war, the samurai from the Land of Iron stepped in to act as peace keepers, hoping to avoid another violent war when no one, especially civilian settlements, had yet to recover.

Neither Leaf nor Cloud had any intentions of settling things peacefully, but both humoured the samurai, offering pretty words and making token efforts to work things out. No, despite the interference of the samurai, war was coming once more, Leaf and Cloud were just using them as an excuse to delay it.

It was five tense years before the official start of the war. Both villages had used the time to build up their forces and strengthen defences. Behind the backs of the naive samurai who believed progress was being made, alliances were forged between nations in preparation for battle. The samurai and civilians may have believed peace was possible, but every ninja village across the continent was well aware that was a fool's dream.

Despite their animosity during the third war, Cloud and Rock put aside their differences in the face of a common and greater enemy, and forged a strong alliance. The damage Cloud did to Rock was nothing compared to what the Yellow Flash did to them.

Things were more complicated for Leaf, however. Despite the formal alliance with Sand, the ninja from the Land of Wind refused to stand by their word.

"We just ended a war," I'm told the Kazekage said. "We have no interest in fighting another."

Leaf ninja were furious, and I can't blame them, but the Hokage was well aware there was little they could do. Indeed, they could not make Sand fight with them, and any attempts at retaliation would only lead to Sand siding with Cloud and Rock. Sand ninja were persona non grata in Leaf, and would be for years to come.

It was a betrayal, a deep one, considering Leaf wasn't the one at fault for the conflict.

Fortunately for Leaf, they were approached for an alliance by Mist. Apparently, Cloud had a "treaty" in the works with Mist as well, and it wasn't hard to guess how Cloud intended for it to end.

The alliance was tense at first, but during the Preparation Period as it would later be called, Leaf and Mist established a close, mutually beneficial relationship. The Leaf discreetly sent medical ninja to Mist, as medicine was an area they were sorely lacking in, and in return Mist shared their poisons and brought over many exotic, deadly plants for the Leaf's greenhouses.

Trade boomed between the two villages—Leaf had exclusive contracts from mining companies in Mountain Country, and the ore was passed on to the expert weapon smiths in Mist, who forged blades sharper and more durable than the Leaf could ever hope to.

The two nations were lucky—there was only Red Bean Country and a few island nations separating them. Trade routes were long, but discreet. Supplies were sent south down the Yamato river in Fire Country until it joined the ocean. Then they sailed around the main land and up the Kurokono river in Water Country to Mist. Of course, once the war officially started and Rock and Cloud were aware of the alliance, the route was altered to prioritize speed over secrecy.

And of course, Leaf also had a hidden ally in the Land of Rice Fields, positioned half way between Lighting and Earth, keeping an eye on the comings and going of their enemies.

-x-

It was a waiting game for Hidden Leaf. The village had never eased up on war time protocols, and so the academy was churning out graduates in large batches every six months. Enrollment was highly encouraged, even among civilian families. If one had a ninja in their family, after all, they received more rations when the war started.

And unlike when the nation was actively at war, there was time to train the fresh graduates adequately. Most jounin in the village had taught a team of genin during the Preparation Period, if only until their chuunin promotions. The jounin who weren't occupied training new recruits were busy running A and S rank missions, boosting the village's income so there was a nice nest egg when the war started.

Similarly, less experienced ninja were working the farm land south of the village, their use of chakra increasing the efficiency of harvesting and growing. Crop yields were at an all time high, the excess stockpiled in the village.

The Village Hidden in the Leaves was ready for war, but they could not be the ones to abandon the peace talks—they were already able to largely portray themselves as the victims, and being the ones to officially start the war could turn sympathizers against them. No, they had to wait, and while they did so, they grew stronger.

Eventually, Cloud moved. Again, I hardly know the details, but from my understanding they accused one of the samurai leading the peace talks of being a spy for Leaf, though their evidence was circumstantial at best, and attacked. The Leaf ninja present jumped to the defence of the remaining samurai, and thus the first battle began.

Personally, I'm willing to bet the samurai accused of espionage truly _was_ guilty. That, or dead and impersonated by a Leaf ninja on a suicide mission to kick off the war. The fact that despite the samurai's own skill and combat and the defence the Leaf ninja provided, the only survivors of the battle were ninja didn't help my suspicions.

Like I said, Leaf may appear to be the nice village, but it's only because they're the best liars.

-x-

Notes: This... was intended to be an intro scene. But after 500 words it grew too long for one, so it's an interlude, hence my decision to use the number i to number the chapter. Complex numbers seemed a fun way to number things outside of the main chapters, don't you agree? The fact that the intro scene turned into 1K+ words meant I had to go and write an actual intro scene for chapter five though. Bah.

Thanks for reading,

The Mathemagician


	9. Seven

Against The World

"They say four is death. We would see if that held true."

-x-

"She requested information on sealing."

"Is that so...? Very well, have Uzumaki-san pass along the introductory scrolls."

"Are you sure that's wise?"

"The Uzumaki boy was a complete disappointment—the son of two seal masters, yet he had no talent or interest. Minato and Kushina won't live forever, we need to secure a seal master for the village. We already know the girl is one of the smartest we've seen in years, if she has any aptitude for the subject... She's our best bet."

-x-

Seven

The evening after I graduated I moved into the dorms—which was what the housing for ninja who can't afford anything better is called. The dorms were half way across the village, near the training grounds, and I was lucky to have my storage seals for the trip. I didn't have many possessions, but I did have a couple box fulls that would have been annoying to transport otherwise.

I was assigned to unit 420, which amused me to no end.

The dorm only had one room if you didn't count the small bathroom. There was a small kitchen area with a stove, sink, fridge and cupboards in the right corner closest to the door. The floors of the room were scuffed and the paint on the cupboards peeling, betraying the fact that I wasn't the first resident.

In the corner across from the kitchen there was a small table with two unmatched chairs.

The door to the bathroom, which was in the back left corner, was straight across from the entrance. A loft bed was nestled in the far right corner between three walls. It was already made, with plain white sheets and a grey quilt. Underneath it were multiple drawers for storage.

Anything else I'd have to buy myself.

I unsealed my clothes first, and carefully placed them in one of the drawers under the bed. Then I moved onto the bathroom and arranged the toiletries. Finally, I put my spare sealing ink in the bottom drawer.

I was unpacked and the room was just as empty as it had been when I started. With nothing left to do, I climbed up onto my bed and lay down. I took my forehead protector from my pocket and held it up, trying to decide where I should wear it. The forehead was the obvious choice, but it wouldn't work very well with my typical hairstyle. I closed my eyes and tried to recall as many ninja as I could. I'd seen it worn in several different places, like around the arm or waist. A few people wore it pinned over their hearts, but that was the last place I wanted to put it.

After a lot of thought, I decided to wear it around my neck. Like a collar. Like I was a dog, and belonged to Hidden Leaf.

-x-

"...Team Four is Hoshino Sekai, Haruno Sakura and Yamanaka Aiko." Kago-sensei announced.

"Who's Haruno Sakura?" I nudged Aiko, who was sitting next to me, as usual.

"I don't know. She wasn't in our class, I think." the blonde whispered back. "I guess—"

"Ahem! Just because _your_ team has been announced, doesn't mean you can start talking!" Sensei barked.

"Apologies, sensei." Aiko and I chorused. We remained silent for the rest of the team placements.

"Congratulations on graduating." Sensei said with a smile. "I'm pleased that all of you have made it this far, and hope that you will do your village proud. Remember, the Will of Fire burns strongly in each of you, so you can always draw on its strength and endure. Teams Five through Forty-one are dismissed for lunch, you're expected to return here in an hour to meet your jounin instructor. Teams One through Four, please follow me across the hall."

Aiko and I exchanged a glance, but dutifully followed the chuunin to the smaller classroom. At his gesture we all found a seat.

"I'm sure the twelve of you are wondering why your teams have been singled out." he started. "The reason is that you've all been selected to be part of a trial run for a modified genin team dynamic.

"There are certain roles in the village that are extremely important, especially with the ongoing war. However it is also important that the these ninja pass on their knowledge and skills to the next generation. Therefore, each of you will be assigned a mentor for a specific field. Your mentors will teach you individually, for the most part, but will take turns leading your missions and overseeing mandatory team training. Any questions can be answered by your mentors. You have fifty five minutes for lunch—please return to this classroom within that time. Please take care."

Kago-sensei left the room, and three of the other graduates followed after him, but the rest of us decided to eat and wait in the classroom.

"Haruno Sakura?" Aiko called. A pink haired girl looked up at us through her bangs.

"Yes?" she squeaked.

"I'm Yamanaka Aiko, and this is Sekai-chan. We're the other two members of Team Four. Would you like to come sit with us?" Aiko asked with a smile.

"Sure." She nodded and bit her lip, gathering up her bento and coming to sit on the other side of Aiko. "It's nice to meet you."

Great, a shy one, it seems. "You too." I replied.

The three of us ate in awkward silence until we all finished our lunches.

"So..." Aiko started. Here eyes darted between Sakura and I. "Sakura-chan, me and Sekai-chan have been in the same class for two years, but we haven't met you before. What class were you in? How old are you?"

"Oh, um. Well, I was supposed to have three terms left, but Michibi-sensei wanted me to try early, and I passed. I guess it was because of this?" Sakura answered hesitantly. "Oh, um. And I'm ten. What about you two?"

"Oh, you're a year younger than me, than. I'm eleven." Aiko smiled. "Sekai-chan is seven. I'm wondering who my sensei is supposed to be, and in what. I'm a Yamanaka, so probably infiltration or interrogation. What about you two? Any ideas?"

"Seals." I replied instantly. "I think Uzumaki Kushina will probably by my sensei—I met her a year ago. She's the best seal master in the village, but usually very busy."

"Seals?" Sakura asked, her eyes focusing on my left arm. "Is that what that is?"

"Yes. It's a storage seal."

"Cool. I think maybe a medic will be mine? I've been going to the introductory lessons for academy students, you see, and Nohara-sensei says I'm doing better than the rest of the class." Sakura explained, fiddling with a strand of bubblegum pink hair. "Maybe she wants to take me on?"

For the rest of the lunch period, the three of us continued to get to know each other, and the more we spoke, the further Sakura crawled out of her shell. I noticed that like Aiko, while she was still a little kid, she was smart enough to be tolerable. Hell, she was probably smarter than Aiko.

Our conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a trio of jounin. Once they collected their genin, they left. Time trickled by, and soon it was just the three of us waiting on our own jounin sensei.

"They're late." I commented.

Sakura glanced at the clock. "Only by fifteen minutes. Maybe something came up? I doubt they'll keep us waiting too long."

"I'm sure they'll be here soon." Aiko agreed.

I shrugged in response, and we returned to waiting in a silence as awkward as when we ate.

Another quarter of an hour slipped by before the door burst open.

"Sorry we're like, super late!" called Uzumaki Kushina as she walked into the room with another woman at her side. "Sakura-chan, your instructor is dealing with an emergency surgery, and so Kairi-chan and I were trying to decide if we should like, wait for her or whatever."

"Obviously, we opted not to." the second woman, Kairi-sensei, I inferred, added. She was tall for a woman, with long navy hair that covered the right half of her face. "We left a message for her to meet us at training ground thirty-two when she's done."

"So let's get going, girls!" Kushina-sensei enthused. "C'mon!"

-x-

Training ground thirty-two was a clearing bordered by large oak trees near the Senju compound. There was a small, clear pond in the centre of the training ground. It didn't look too deep, perhaps two metres deeps, give or take.

The entire training ground showed no damage from ninjutsu, but looking closely I noticed that the bark on some of the trees was worn down, and the green grass had been flattened. It must have been one of the grounds where ninjutsu training was forbidden. Though, I'd heard from Aiko that as long as you only used non-destructive ninjutsu, like the three jutsu we were taught in the academy, and most supplementary jutsu, everyone tended to look the other way.

Kushina-sensei plopped down on the ground and motioned for us to join her and Kairi-sensei, who's own descent was much more graceful.

"Alright, everyone!" Kushina began enthusiastically. "My name is Uzumaki Kushina, and this is Kojima Kairi! Sekai-chan will be my apprentice, Aiko-chan will be with Kairi-chan, and Sakura-chan's mentor will be Tsunade-sama." The redhead explained. "I specialize in seals, Kairi-chan specializes in espionage, and Tsunade-sama is a combat medic. The three of us our the best of the best in our respective fields, and we'll be training you to eventually take our places. Any questions so far?"

Sakura raised her hand. "Um... When you say Tsunade-sama will be my mentor, do you mean _Senju_ Tsunade-sama?" she asked hesitantly.

"Yep!" Kushina grinned. "Apparently she's had her eye on you ever since you started the introductory classes."

"What Kushina-sama says is true." Kairi-sensei added with a small smile. "You're very talented, Sakura-chan. According to Tsunade-sama and Nohara-san, you've picked up things much more quickly than ninja twice your age."

The pink haired girl's eyes widened and she flushed, clearly flustered. "O-oh."

"You said we'd eventually replace you." I said. "Replace you in what, exactly?"

Kushina smirked proudly. "I'm the village's Seal Master. A lot of what I do is heavily classified, so I can't tell you much of what I do for the village quite yet, but it's a vital position in the village, and because of it I'm near the top of the jounin hierarchy."

"As for myself," Kairi-sensei started. "I am the head of the Internal Espionage Division, and highly ranked in External as well. I would have been the head of both, but running two departments at the same time as performing missions isn't feasible."

"And of course, Tsunade-sama is the Head Medic, and the only combat medic in the village." Kushina-sensei added.

"Aren't there quite a few combat medics, though? Nohara-sensei was telling me they'd just authorized several medics for mission duty?" Sakura asked with a furrowed brow.

"Those are _field_ medics, kid." A voice from behind the three of us genin interrupted.

"Ah, Tsunade-sama! You're, like, done sooner than Kairi-chan and I expected!" Kushina said as she started vibrating with excitement.

"It was an easy surgery." The woman waved her hand in dismissal as she sat down next to Kushina-sensei. "Brats, I'm Senju Tsunade. You can call me Tsunade-sensei."

"What's the difference between a field medic and a combat medic?" I asked, focusing on the new arrival. She seemed familiar.

"Field medics go on missions with a team, but they are not to join in on the fighting unless the rest of their team is already dead. Unlike hospital medics, they have sufficient skills to keep up with their teammates and defend themselves if necessary." Sakura explained. "Combat medics _do_ participate in battle, and are much more skilled in offensive and defensive capabilities than field medics. I just hadn't realized that Nohara-sensei was speaking about just field medics—I assumed that combat medics weren't so rare."

"Exactly." Tsunade-sensei nodded with a pleased smirk. "Most other villages don't differentiate between field and combat medics, using the terms interchangeably. By our definition, many medics from other villages would be considered combat medics, however they also don't actually meet our standard to qualify as one."

"Now then, I think it's time we explain to you how things are going to work on this team." Kairi-sensei said. "First of all, there will be mandatory team training thrice a week. For some of these sessions, it might be all three of us there, for others it will just be one of us.

"Once we deem you ready, we will start you on missions. In village missions will only take a day, but eventually you will likely be running missions that can take up to a week or more with one of us.

"This rotation will allow us the time to fulfill our own duties while still training you three. Understood?" She finished.

"Yes, sensei." Us genin answered slightly out of sync.

"Alright then. Sekai-chan, you'll, like, meet me tomorrow morning at seven outside the Hokage tower, okay?"

-x-

I was early. Not like, _weirdly_ early, like, an hour or something. No, I was just fifteen minutes early. And yet, I spent forty-five minutes waiting for Kushina-sensei.

Was it normal for her to be late?

By the time it was ten after seven, I decided fuck it, and flipped onto my hands. I lifted one arm and simultaneously brought one of my legs down to meet it. I raised my leg and lowered my arm, then repeated the motion with the other arm and leg. It wasn't strenuous or something, but it was something to keep my body occupied while my thoughts drifted.

The chuunin "guards" standing outside the building and passing academy students gave me odd looks, but I didn't particularly care.

"What are you doing?" Kushina-sensei asked upon her (late!) arrival.

"Keeping myself occupied." I answered as I flipped back to my feet.

"Well, you do you, Sekai-chan." She commented with a raised eyebrow. "Come on, let's go to my office."

I blinked in surprise. She had an office in the Hokage tower? That was... uncommon, to say the least. Very few people had offices there, and all who did were extremely high up on the village food chain.

Sensei must have been more important than I would have ever assumed.

I followed her into the building, where she stopped and talked to the two women sitting at the reception quickly, then pulled me long. I was led through a maze of stairs and hallways—both going up flights of stairs and down them. I couldn't even keep track of which floor I was on very well, as by my estimates, some of the rooms were only half a level below others. By the time we reached her windowless office, I had no idea what level I was on, and wasn't sure if I was on the east side or the west of the tower.

"It's confusing on purpose, isn't it." I observed.

"Yep! It took me ages to figure it out on my own." Sensei replied with a giggle. "There are only a couple places that are fairly straight forward to get to. Hell, most ninja enter the Hokage's office through the windows because it's a lot quicker than navigating through the building." She shrugged. "I mean, getting to the office isn't too difficult comparatively..."

"I noticed things made little sense at the hospital as well. From the little I've seen of it, I can't find a pattern in the room numbers." I commented.

"Yeah, we do that a lot. Keeps civilians from nosing their way around, and will confuse an enemy impersonating a Leaf ninja.

"Enough about that though, I'm here to tell you about what we'll be working on, and what you'll be expected to do when you eventually replace me." I tilted my chin in acknowledgement, and sat down in one of the armchairs at sensei's direction. The chair was large, so I allowed myself to sit with my legs crossed, since Kushina-sensei didn't seem the sort to care. My fingers started tapping my knees as I took a moment to take in my surroundings.

The room was covered from ceiling to floor with papers, books and scrolls. Ink stains covered the large desk and the wheeled chair behind it, as well as most other furniture, including the two arm chairs Kushina-sensei and I sat on. Brushes and pens were scattered across every available surface. Bookshelves lined all but one of the walls, which had numerous papers covered in half finished seals stuck to it.

"First of all, sealing is an old and dying ninja art. Seal master's are _vital._ " Sensei stressed. "The village needs them, but few show any interest in learning sealing. Which is why when teachers, or in some cases, clan leaders and family members, learn of someone interested in it, we provide basic information and see if they stick with it. Not only did you stick with it, but you've shown aptitude for it. Aptitude beyond what anyone would expect.

"Initially, the village hoped my son would replace me, as the Uzumaki clan, while almost extinct, is still feared today for our prowess with seals. My husband is also proficient with seals, so the village was hopeful. Unfortunately," Sensei let out a long sigh. "My son has neither the interest nor aptitude for the subject, and refuses to study it at all. On top of that, it is too risky for me to have another child. It's unfortunate...

"When I say my clan is dead, what I mean is that we used to be as large as the Uchiha clan, but now there are only a handful of survivors scattered across the continent, and it's doubtful any are proficient in Uzumaki sealing, aside from myself." Kushina-sensei stared at the bookshelves, a faraway look in her dark blue eyes. "Uzumaki sealing is very powerful. It was my clan's secret technique, and, well... The village can't afford to lose it. Which is why," she fixed her gaze on me, the expression on her face conveying just how serious she was. "Under several conditions, I am willing to teach it to you."

I was taken aback, and the tapping of my fingers faltered for a moment. Nobody showed an outsider family jutsu and techniques. _It just wasn't done_. To be offered the chance to learn them? It wasn't just something that rarely happened, as far as I could remember I'd never heard of it being done before.

"Sensei... Are you sure?" I asked. She nodded. "What..." I licked my lips quickly. "What are your conditions?"

"All things considered, they are very lenient." The redhead smiled reassuringly. "The first is that if I am no longer around to teach any of my grandchildren, that you teach them. The second condition, is that unless I have no grandchildren or they decide to follow Naruto's path, you don't teach Uzumaki sealing techniques to anyone else."

"Please clarify the second condition." I requested.

"I mean that you can only teach this to students who are not members of the Uzumaki clan if there are no Uzumaki who are able and willing to learn. Uzumaki take precedence." Kushina explained. "Furthermore, if you must take on an apprentice that's not part of my clan, they follow the same conditions you do. And you may only teach a single non-Uzumaki apprentice my clan's secret techniques in your lifetime, unless the apprentice dies before you. In that case you may take on another."

I repeatedly tapped two fingers against my chin as I pondered her offer. It wasn't just lenient, it may as well have been that there _were_ no conditions at all. I was expecting to have to declare not just my own fealty to the clan, but the fealty of any descendents as well. Or something even worse. It was a no brainer.

"I accept."

-x-

After I had accepted Sensei's conditions, we spent time going over going over what I was already able to do with seals. The process was tedious, as it involved Kushina-sensei asking me increasingly in depth questions about different aspects of sealing, including some I'd yet to even hear of, like linked seals.

It had been late afternoon by the time she declared she had a thorough understanding of where I was skill-wise. Once that was done, she had me spend ages doing paper work. I had to fill out what felt like hundreds of forms.

One was for clearance to learn the basics about defensive seals, apparently in preparation for eventually learning how the village's worked and maintaining them, never mind that the stuff I was applying for clearance to learn was too basic to even be relevant to or of use against the village's seals, but that was ninja hoarding and paranoia for you.

There were other similar forms that covered different areas of sealing, and they were pretty much the same as the other one and simple to fill out, but frustrating in that I'd had to write the same thing on at least six or seven of them.

Another was for clearance to wander the restricted areas in the Hokage tower unaccompanied. Which basically referred to most of the tower, excluding the academy portion, the Hokage's office and the way there, the lobby, and the mission rooms. By the time I finished it all, it was late enough that sensei sent me home.

Fucking paper work. No wonder the founders decided to build the village in a forest, if they hadn't, we'd never have enough paper to run this god forsaken place.

-x-

The next day I met with Kushina-sensei at one of the training grounds instead of her office.

Once again, I had opted to arrive fifteen minutes early, though this time I brought a book to keep me occupied if sensei was late a third time. (One is an accident, twice is a coincidence, and thrice is a pattern.)

As I read my book, I ran laps around the training ground, and so that was how sensei found me.

"Oh my god." Sensei groaned as she landed from her jump from the trees. "You're just like my husband's student—he's _always_ reading, regardless of what he's doing."

"I must balance actions which generate spiritual energy by generating physical energy at the same time, or else my chakra imbalance will become even worse." I told her.

"Well, at least you have a reason." She admitted, and then crossed her arms and scowled. "Minato's student just does it to be a little shit, if you ask me."

I merely stared at her, having no idea what she was talking about. On the bright side, at least she was on time today.

My redheaded teacher sighed at my lack of response with a small shake of her head. "Right, well, today we're going to spar so I can assess your taijutsu."

I nodded and fell into my preferred stance, watching her carefully. Unlike yesterday, when she wore a simple calf-length green dress, she was dressed in a much shorter sleeveless dress, which showed off her muscular arms, with a thick black belt around her waist. Beneath it she wore black leggings which ended just above her knees. I supposed this was her training about combat attire.

Kushina-sensei held herself loosely, not even bothering to fall into any taijutsu stance. "Well?" She said. "C'mon. The time you spend just standing there is time I'm never gonna get back, you know."

I pounced at her. She gracefully dodged my first attack, and then my second, third and fourth as well, each without comment. My fifth attack, a kick aimed to her torso, she blocks instead. "Decent power behind that one." She commented. "Room for improvement, but impressive for your age."

Ignoring her comment, I continued my (hopeless) assault until she abruptly kicked me into the air. I flipped in the air and landed on my feet just in time to dodge her fist.

From there I was one hundred percent on the defensive. I did my best to evade her, and blocked what I couldn't dodge but she still managed to get in several good hits.

It felt like ages, but it must have been no more than twenty or so minutes before she called time. I was panting from exertion, but Kushina-sensei hadn't even broken a sweat.

"Not bad, Sekai-chan." She told me with a grin. "You did a lot better than I expected. You're pretty fast for a genin, yanno?"

I shrugged a shoulder. No, I didn't know. It wasn't like I knew how fast most genin were.

From there she went on to critique my performance. I faltered slightly when I had to go on the defensive, my transitions still weren't the smoothest. Apparently I put to much thought into it, when my movements should have been instinctive.

"I shall endeavour to improve my taijutsu to an acceptable standard." I told her once she was finished.

"Oh, um. No! I didn't mean to say you were, like, doing _poorly_ , or that you're not suited for taijutsu, just that those were, like, the areas that needed more work! You're good for a fresh genin!" Sensei rambled as she flailed her arms in an attempt to get her point across.

"Kushina-sensei," I interrupted. "I understood what you meant."

"Oh." She grinned bashfully, rubbing her neck. "Right. Okay. Good.

"Anyways, aside from teaching you sealing, another reason I was selected as your sensei was because I primarily use taijutsu when engaging opponents, and since you don't have much aptitude for ninjutsu, it will be one of the main aspects of your combat style."

"I thought it would be, but I was also told I'll likely have an aptitude for genjutsu. Will you be teaching it to me?" I asked.

"Well, to be honest I suck at genjutsu. Like most Uzumaki, I have skewed chakra, favouring physical energy. But! Don't worry about it. I'm working on finding someone who can teach you genjutsu, okay?"

"Okay." I agreed. "Why did you decide to focus on taijutsu for yourself?" I couldn't help but ask her.

"Well... I'm pretty good with ninjutsu these days, but when I was a kid and first starting out, I _sucked_ at ninjutsu. The closest thing to ninjutsu that I used was my manifestation of the Uzumaki bloodline limit, which worked really well with taijutsu. So, since you have a problem with ninjutsu like I used to, it means I know a lot of what you need to learn instead, especially fighting against ninjutsu specialists." She explained. "Even these days I don't use ninjutsu in direct combat—most that I know do large scale damage and are best for sabotage."

I nodded slowly. It made sense. Learn how to fight without relying on ninjutsu from someone who primarily fights without ninjutsu. "Your bloodline limit?"

"Ah, you'll have to wait and see, Sekai-chan!"

-x-

After training had finished for the day, I went to Suzuki Kashiya, which was a nice little cafe specializing in various sugary delights. It was one of my favourite places in the village, but not one that I made it to very often.

It was a cute little store, with a pale blue front, a black arched door and a large window framed with black shutters that bore the shop's name in elegant lettering.

I pushed the door open, and saw that both Aiko and Sakura were already there and waiting for me.

"You look tired." Aiko commented instead of greeting me. I shrugged. "Well, since you're _finally_ here—"

"Ah, Aiko-chan, you've only been here for a couple minutes..." Sakura interjected softly.

"Right, good point. Anyways, since you're _finally here_ , Sekai-chan, we can order now. C'mon. It's my treat, so get whatever you want, Sekai-chan, Sakura-chan." Aiko offered.

"Are you sure?" I asked. She nodded in response, so the three of us headed over to the counter.

"I'll have the house tea with some hakuto jelly, please." Aiko ordered, and looked at Sakura.

"I'll have green tea with one of those pear tarts."

I hummed as I looked over the variety of desserts and sweets available. "I'll have green tea, two of the choco bananas, a slice of your strawberry shortcake, a candied strawberry—no wait, make that two, and a crepe—surprise me with the filling. Please."

Aiko and Sakura gave me incredulous looks when I completed my order. "Is that everything?" Aiko asked sarcastically as she adjusted her glasses. I just nodded, and watched Aiko pay for the order. The price of my portion ended up being twice as much as my teammates' put together. I didn't feel bad about it though. Aiko was a clan kid, and I knew she was from one of the wealthier branches of the Yamanaka clan.

"...That's quite a bit, Sekai-chan." Sakura mumbled once we were seated with our orders.

My blonde friend snorted. "That's a bit of an understatement."

"I require sustenance." I told them around one of the choco bananas. "I'm a growing girl." I told them once I swallowed.

"Please, Sekai-chan. I've known you for almost two years and you've only grown like, two centimetres since your first day at the academy." Aiko laughed.

"I've grown _five_ , thank you very much." I snapped. My height, or rather, my lack of, was a bit of a sore subject, not that many knew that. The medic who did my pre-academy medical exam said I would always be a bit short, but I was a good bit beyond short—barely hitting the one metre mark.

"Oh, wow. Five whole centimetres. That's _soooo_ , impressive, Sekai-chan." Aiko drawled, eliciting a soft giggle from Sakura. "I guess it seemed like less since _I_ grew twelve centimetres in the same time period, so it just seemed like you were getting shorter and shorter."

"Shut the fuck up, Aiko." I grumbled and shoved a forkful of cake in my mouth. It was time to change the subject. "Sakura, you've been fairly quiet."

"Yeah, you've been quieter than _Sekai-chan_."

"O-oh." Sakura's eyes widened. "Well, I mean... The two of you seem very familiar, and I just didn't want to intrude."

"We invited you!" Aiko protested. "You can't intrude when you're invited. Besides, we're teammates, so you're one of us now!"

"One of us. One of us. One of us." I chanted monotonously, and then shoved more cake in my mouth. It was absolutely _delicious_.

-x-

 **Notes:** What? Sakura of all people graduating early, but not any of the other rookie nine?! There is a reason for this, I swear! I will elaborate on it more later. Also, this Sakura has never met Ino, hence she is still rather shy. I mostly made team 4 all female because that's something we never see and fuck that, GIRL POWER.

Kashiya means candy store/sweet shop/confectionery shop, etc. Candied strawberries, peach tarts, hakuto jelly, crepes, and choco bananas are all fairly common Japanese sweets.

Secondly, I apologize for the delay. I've been working on a lot of organizing and planning for this fic. Secondly, I was just discharged from partial hospitalization on Friday, which I'd been in since the end of May. That, obviously, took up a lot of time and energy. Hopefully I get the next chapter out sooner.

Thanks for all the support. Don't forget to check out the sekai-against-the-world tumblr, I post maps, floor plans, character stats, trivia, progress updates, answer asks, etc.

All the best,

The Mathemagician


	10. Eight

Against The World

"Follow the letter, not the intent."

-x-

The sound of the door opening and closing roused me from my afternoon nap.

"Mother?" I said blearily as I glanced at the clock on the wall. It was only just past one in the afternoon. "You're home early."

"There was a bit of an accident at work, love." She answered. "Someone ran into me while I was carrying a tray, and soup spilled all over me, so they sent me home. I'm exhausted, so I'm just going to bed, okay?"

"'Kay." I mumbled, and flopped over to go back to sleep, not realizing that was the last thing I'd ever say to my mother.

-x-

Eight

Our first team training session was with Tsunade-sensei, since Kairi-sensei and Kushina-sensei were out running missions for the next few days.

"Welcome to your first team session." Tsunade-sensei greeted. "Today, we're going to do a little training exercise. Usually, genin teams are tested by their jounin sensei, and if they fail, they're sent back to the academy. The three of you are lucky—you didn't have to deal with that." Sakura and Aiko, who both stood to my left, traded nervous glances, likely wondering where this was going. "But I'm going to give you the test I'd have given if that were the case." Tsunade-sensei smiled cruelly. "If you pass, you will be rewarded. If you fail, you will be harshly punished."

Sakura and Aiko gulped audibly, but I didn't react to her words. Tsunade-sensei reached inside her green haori and pulled out two small bells from what I assumed was an interior pocket. She held the two bells in front of us, and jingled them, smirking all the while.

"Your task is to take one of these from me. I'll be holding them in my right hand the whole time, and if I drop them unintentionally, then the test ends immediately. Whoever gets and keeps a bell throughout the test within the next hour passes. Those who don't, fail. Understood?" she explained brusquely.

"There are only two bells though." Aiko frowned. "Does that mean that at least one of us will fail?"

"I think the answer to that is quite obvious, isn't it?" Tsunade replied. "And we begin _now._ "

As soon as she declared the test had commenced, all three of us put distance between both each other and Tsunade-sensei.

I took to the trees with the intention of taking a moment to plan and keep an eye on Tsunade-sensei while I did so. Tsunade-sensei was legendary—she was probably one of the top five most powerful Leaf ninja. There was no way I would be able to get one of those bells from her, let alone Aiko or Sakura.

That didn't stop Aiko from making the first move, though. She burst out of the trees and bushes and made a mad dash towards Tsunade-sensei, throwing a handful of kunai. The legendary ninja easily side stepped them, but my blonde teammate aimed another volley of kunai at her new position. They kept up the dance of projectiles and dodging for almost a minute, until Aiko was right in front of Tsunade-sensei and pulled on something, a wire, by my guess. All her projectiles were pulled from the ground and came flying towards the elder blonde's back. Tsunade dodged them by jumping into the air, causing the ground to crack and shake, and Aiko was forced to release the wire she'd been pulling on and make a clumsy retreat, lest she end up impaled by her own weapons. With a scowl on her face, she leaped into the trees once more.

Aiko's attempt made it all the more clear just how futile it was to face her head on. Not to mention, seeing Aiko's strategy through, it was obvious that at most, all it might have accomplished is cutting the strings Tsunade-sensei held the bells by, and only if she was lucky.

Then it hit me.

If I obtained a bell within an hour I passed. If Tsunade-sensei dropped the bells unintentionally, the test ended.

If she dropped the bells _before_ the hour was up, I could still grab one within the hour time limit. After all, she never specified that I had to get a bell _during_ the test, just that I had to get one _within an hour._ Not only that, but she didn't say we had to keep the bells after the test ends, so if we force it to end before we take the bells, then we can just pass the bells around between the three of us, and so we each got a bell within the time limit.

By my internal clock, only about eight minutes had passed since the start of the exam. That gave me roughly fifty-two minutes to grab my teammates, make a plan, and execute it.

Without further ado, I went off to find the other two genin.

I found Sakura first, and all I had to do was tell her that I found away for all three of us to pass, and she followed me in my search for Aiko.

Once we found her, I laid out the loophole I had discovered.

"Are you sure that will actually work, Sekai-chan?" Sakura asked as she gnawed at her bottom lip. "I mean, that's clearly not how the test is supposed to work..."

I shrugged. "My suggested course of action falls within the parameters of the mission." I paused for a moment, then corrected myself. "Test. The parameters of the test."

"But the test has already ended at that point." Aiko pointed out. "Can you pass a test that has already ended?"

I tilted my head and looked Aiko in the eye as best I could through the shiny lens of her glasses. "You can only pass or fail _after_ the test."

Sakura frowned in thought for a moment, but quickly came to a conclusion. "There's no harm in trying..."

"I suppose." The blonde finally agreed. "Do you have a plan?"

-x-

Sakura ran towards her mentor, attempting a direct attack with taijutsu, being sure to go after the arm that held the bells. Tsunade-sensei smoothly dodged her first few attempts, but eventually grew bored of dodging and flicked Sakura away with her free hand.

My teammate flew a short distance through the air, and finally came to a rolling stop. Instead of trying again, Sakura fled back into the trees, where I was hiding. I gave her a thumbs up, and we started counting silently.

Just as we reached a hundred and fifty-three seconds, Aiko burst forth from the opposite side of the clearing. Like her first attempt, she threw barrages of kunai and shuriken at Tsunade-sensei, which the older blonde dodged with ease. The training ground was half covered by the time the Aiko pulled back.

I had no idea if Tsunade attempted to move from where she stood, but if she did, she failed.

When Sakura had been kicked back by Tsunade, she had planted a handful of what I called freeze tag seals as she rolled, and Aiko herded Tsunade right on top of them.

With Tsunade-sama disabled, I finally emerged from the trees, and slowly walked towards her, and then kicked the arm that held the bells with as much force as I could muster. Fortunately, it was enough to make her arm shake as the freeze tags resisted movement from the force of my kick, and the bells fell from her hand.

"Oh no." I said as I bent down to pick up the two bells. "The test is over."

My teammates walked over, and I handed each of them a bell.

"Indeed," Aiko agreed with a smirk. "But each of us still managed to get a bell within an hour."

"Which satisfies the conditions required to pass the test." Sakura finished.

With that, I released the seals, freeing Tsunade-sensei, who took a moment to roll her shoulders and flex her muscles.

She gave us a long, considering look, and then burst into laughter. "You got me, brats. I suppose that's what I get for modifying the test as I explained it to you." She shook her head. "Congratulations. That said, it's time I explained to you the _real_ criterion for passing."

"What." The three of us chorused.

Tsunade chuckled again. "All three of you met the criteria that I told you, you needed to meet to pass, but that actually wasn't the real test."

"Fucking ninja mind games." I muttered to myself in English, resulting in strange looks from Sakura and her mentor.

"Just ignore her, she just says gibberish sometimes." Aiko explained.

"Right. Anyways, you also accomplished the _actual_ criterion for passing—you worked together." She told us. "The test is supposed to discourage you from working with your teammates, which is why there are only two bells. Working together, however, is the only way _any_ of you had a chance of accomplishing the "mission," so to speak. If you'd chosen not to work together, you wouldn't have put the mission first, and would have failed. But you were able to succeed because you put the mission before your own interests, and that is one of the most important lessons I can teach you."

Inwardly, I snorted. _Put the mission first_. Fuck that. I'm looking out for my interests first and foremost.

"Now, whoever came up with your plan, explain it."

Aiko and Sakura, the traitors, pointed at me. Throwing me under the bus? I would get them back for that...

"I figured out the loophole, and went to collect my teammates. From there, I thought to draw up my freeze tags, but small enough that they aren't obvious, and subtly place them on the ground, so their ranges overlapped. Once they were in place, it remained to force you over to them." I explained, not letting my annoyance take the form of sarcasm and bleed into my explanation. "After Aiko's initial display, I decided she would do the herding, and Sakura and I gave her all our kunai, shuriken, and senbon. When you stopped messing around with Aiko when she first attacked, I noticed that you sent her flying. Therefore I instructed Sakura to engage in a taijutsu battle with you, and when she was sent flying, to make sure to fall into a roll and discreetly place the seals."

"Not bad, brats." Tsunade acknowledged. "I'm proud of you."

-x-

I had been Kushina-sensei's student for just over a week when she asked me to join her family for dinner. I didn't particularly want to, but I had the feeling there wasn't really another option.

So one Tuesday afternoon we cut training short and sensei led me to her home in the Senju compound.

"The Senju compound...?" I asked as we passed through the gate.

Sensei hummed. "Yeah. The Uzumaki clan was closely related to the Senju, so when I came to Hidden Leaf from Whirlpool Country I stayed here. Back then I lived with Mito-sama, who was an Uzumaki that married into the Senju clan, but when she passed I moved into my own home."

"Oh." I nodded. "Most of these houses look uninhabited. Why?"

"The Senju clan is nearly dead." Sensei smiled sadly. "Tsunade-sama is the only one left, and she won't be having any children. She lives in the main house with Dan-sama. Jiraiya-sensei has a house here too, but he's not in the village much."

"That's..." I looked down, unsure what to say.

"After she dies, the compound will fall to me. I have plans for it, by then." Kushina-sensei confided. "I haven't told many people, just two or three other people know, but I figure if I can trust you with Uzumaki sealing techniques, I can trust you with this, yeah?"

I nodded wordlessly, unsure how to respond.

"Despite the fact that my clan was all but obliterated, there were a lot of survivors from the assault on Whirling Tides, the hidden village of Whirlpool country that was attacked because of my clan. Most of them came here, and I want to open up the compound to them, and rename it the Whirlpool compound."

"You should." I said, earning a soft smile.

The rest of the trip passed in silence, until we reached a large, round, pale blue house with a more saturated blue roof.

"Here we are!" Kushina-sensei announced as she unlocked the door with a pulse of chakra to the seal on the handle. "Come on in. My husband and son won't be home yet, so I'll give you the tour and then you can help me cook dinner, okay?"

I nodded as I followed her through the threshold. I slipped out of my sandals and into the guest slippers sensei pointed to, then followed Kushina-sensei around the house.

It was beautiful and had an open floor plan. The wooden floors were decorated with colourful rugs, and paintings hung on almost every wall. The ceiling was low, and stairs hugged the curved walls, spiralling around the house like a helix.

The first floor contained the dining area, kitchen and living room. A bathroom, a couple offices and a small library could be found on the second floor. The third and fourth floors held a bathroom and four bedrooms each. The furniture throughout the house was a combination of dark wood and bright fabrics.

"Is there anything you don't eat?" Sensei inquired after the tour.

"Shellfish." I replied. In The Before I'd been allergic. I wasn't in this life, but the avoidance was ingrained in me, and the few times I'd tried I couldn't make myself eat more than a couple bites.

"Hm... Alright. How do you feel about tonkatsu for dinner?"

"That sounds good." I agreed.

"Alright. Can you prepare the pork while I start on the miso soup and rice?"

I froze. "Sensei?"

"Yes, Sekai-chan?"

"... You should probably be made aware that I..."I paused for a moment, trying how to phrase it in a way that didn't sound pathetic. "I am lacking in talent and knowledge of the culinary variety."

What followed was an interrogation about my eating habits. Sensei was appalled to learn that the orphanage never taught me to cook, and that I'd mostly been surviving on instant ramen, raw vegetables, and plain rice since I left. In my defence, the foods here were very different from the things I ate in The Before, and even then I wasn't much of a cook.

Once she finished scolding me, she proceeded to show me how to cut off the fat and flatten the pork cutlets, and then how to coat them and fry them.

Half way through, her son arrived home from the academy. He shouted a greeting to his mother, but didn't seem to notice me, and headed straight up stairs, presumably to his room.

By the time her husband and a masked man with silver hair arrived home, I was setting the table.

"Oh, hello." the mother fucking _Yellow Flash_ said. "You must be Kushina's apprentice. Sekai-chan, right?" I nodded. "I'm Uzumaki Minato. It's nice to meet you. This is Hatake Kakashi, my own former student."

"Yo." the masked man waved lazily.

"It's nice to meet you Uzumaki-san, Hatake-san. I'm Hoshino Sekai."

"Ah, Minato-san is fine! We're not very formal here." The Yellow Flash smiled sheepishly and scratched the back of his neck.

His student nodded in agreement. "Kakashi is just fine."

"Okay, Minato-san, Kakashi-senpai."

"Naruto! Dinner's ready!" Kushina-sensei hollered as she carried the serving dishes into the dining room with _huge, glowing yellow fucking chains coming out of her motherfucking back._ _ **What the actual fuck?**_

Sensei noticed my staring, and smirked. "Bloodline."

I let out a small sigh. Trust sensei to reveal her bloodline limit by using it to serve dinner.

A familiar blond boy came pounding down the stairs into the dining room. "Eh?" He squinted at me. "Who's this kid?"

"Naruto, this is my apprentice, Sekai-chan. Sekai-chan, this is my son, Naruto." Sensei introduced.

"Nice to meet you, Naruto-san." I said blandly. This was the kid who almost ran me over in my first year. Small world.

"What?! Mom, this shrimp is your apprentice?" He scoffed in disbelief. "No way! You mean this baby is already a genin and an awesome ninja like me is stuck in the academy?"

My eye twitched, but I remained silent. He was a brat, but just a kid. Kids are brats.

"Naruto!" Kushina-sensei scolded. "Don't, like, be so rude!"

Naruto huffed, but quieted under his mother's stern glare. "Whatever..." he muttered as he took a seat at the dining room table.

Sensei took the seat at the head of the table, and her husband took the one between her and their son. I took the seat across from Minato-san, and Kakashi-senpai slipped in the chair to my right.

"Thank you for the meal!" We all chorused.

Small talk was made while we ate, but I mostly kept silent, unless addressed directly. Unfortunately, Kushina-sensei wasn't too pleased with my silence.

"Come on, Sekai-chan! Speak up. You're family now." She cajoled.

"Oh." I faltered, unsure of what to say.

"You know," she said, her voice taking on a sly edge. "Maybe one day you'll marry Naruto and _really_ become part of the family."

Naruto turned red and choked on his food, and I wrinkled my nose slightly. "I'm not interested in little kids." I said.

"Hey!" The blond boy protested. "Who are you calling little? I'm older than you! You're like, what, five?"

"I'm seven." I corrected with a sniff. "And I'll have you know I prefer older men."

Sensei burst out laughing, and Minato-san smiled too. "Well," he began teasingly. "Perhaps you'll marry Kakashi instead?"

Kakashi-senpai, who'd somehow managed to finish most of his portion without taking off his mask, froze, his single visible eye going wide.

"Well..." I said, focusing on the silver haired ninja and feigning consideration. "I don't think that's a viable option." Kakashi-senpai let out a small breath of relief. "I hardly want to marry someone who's old enough to be my grandfather."

The chopsticks in senpai's hands snapped in half, and the three Uzumaki burst into laughter.

-x-

Kairi-sensei led us on our first mission. Initially, I was excited for it, as were my teammates. Until we read the mission scroll.

Our mission was to act as intra-village carrier pigeons.

It was boring, but after going collecting the bag of mail to deliver, we didn't complain. It was a lot, but it was doable.

But then after we started delivering, people would hand us _more_ and that was how we ended up running back and forth to different departments across the village for a whole day, and all Kairi-sensei did was smirk at us the entire time.

And that was how the month passed—doing important, but boring and tedious D-rank missions, and training.

There was little to say about training, other than that all three of us learned a lot from our mentors in that period, and improved our team work.

Well, that and I demonstrated how much of a disaster I was with projectiles.

It started when Kushina-sensei took me to training ground eighteen. Eighteen turned out to be one of the handful of indoor training grounds, specifically, it was the target room.

The room was the size of a gymnasium from The Before, and was filled with circular targets and wooden panels every where.

"Welcome to training ground eighteen!" Kushina grinned. "As you can see, we will be training with projectiles today! We'll start easy and slowly increase the difficulty!"

"...Must we?" I asked. I had a bad feeling about where this was going.

"Why are you so reluctant, your projectile scores were excellent at the academy?" Kushina-sensei asked with a furrowed brow. I didn't answer. "It's unlikely for you to ever be able to frequently use ninjutsu without risking chakra exhaustion, if you're even able to make the jutsu _work_ properly. You need something you can use at a distance if necessary. Kunai, senbon, shuriken and the like are the best option for that. Now c'mon, get in the middle, and I'll go to the controls. Try to hit any target that you see, starting at the count of three."

Without further protest, I followed her directions. "One…" sensei counted. "Two… Three!"

Just after she shouted the number three, a handful of boards descended, each bearing numerous circular targets.

I quickly reached for my kunai and started tossing them at the targets as fast as I could calculate the trajectory, which was pretty damn fast, at this point. Once all the targets had a kunai embedded in the bull's eye, the boards rose out of the way.

"Good job, Sekai-chan!" Kushina encouraged. "There was no need to worry! You've got this! Time for round two!"

Round two consisted of _moving_ targets. Fortunately, they were all moving at a uniform velocity, so it wasn't too terribly difficult to calculate the trajectory, but it took a bit longer, and I only hit a couple bull's eyes, and even missed a couple targets. The reason it took longer than before was partially because I had to add in a new variable, the velocity, and partially the time it to observe the moment of the targets to figure out their velocity.

From there, things only got worse. The targets started moving at varying speeds in unpredictable directions, and I completely fucked it all up.

After seeing my total failure, Kushina-sensei came down to talk to me about what was making things so difficult.

"My equations don't work." I told her.

"...What?"

"For calculating the trajectory. More variables have been added into the equation, some of which I can't predict because there is no pattern to the speed and direction of the targets' movement." I elaborated.

"...What?" Kushina-sensei repeated.

"I have terrible aim without the equations I use to predict the trajectory of the kunai."

"...What?"

I sighed, and that was the start of a very long discussion. By the end of it, we concluded that training with projectiles would be a waste of time, and Kushina-sensei decided that putting time into genjutsu would be much more productive.

-x-

I walked through the Uchiha district, following the directions to their private training ground that Kushina-sensei wrote out for me.

It was strange. There were so many people, but nearly everyone was clearly an Uchiha. I supposed that it made sense, considering the Uchiha clan was by far the largest clan in the village, with a population of approximately three thousand. For comparison, the population of the entire village was roughly ninety-three thousand.

I was relieved when I got off the main streets and into the outskirts of the training grounds. My purple hair stood out and garnered more attention than I'd like. I didn't think the clan was used to seeing outsiders too often.

When I finally arrived at the training ground it was already occupied by a young man with tousled black hair who was sitting in the middle of it.

"Hi." I said, unsure if he was my genjutsu tutor or if I was in the wrong spot. Sensei's directions weren't exactly easy to follow.

"You must be Sekai-chan." he smiled and stood up. "I'm Uchiha Shisui. It's nice to meet you."

"Thank you for agreeing to teach me." I bowed politely.

"Eh, well... It's not going to be just me, really. My cousin will be teaching you too. Or anyone else who's free and Kushina-nee-chan has blackmail on."

"Blackmail...?" I inquired warily.

Shisui scratched his cheek as he spoke. "Yeah... She's best friends with Aunt Mikoto, so she has loads of embarrassing pictures of me from my childhood. Among other things..."

"I see."

"Any ways, Kushina-nee-chan probably told you she's horrible with genjutsu, right? Which is why she's having us teach you. But Itachi and I are jounin, and frequently sent out of village, so we don't have time for even a part time student by ourselves, so you'll be shuffled around a bit." he explained. "Sorry about that. Anyways, you can call me Shisui-senpai!"

"I understand, senpai."

"Okay, then let's get started. Have a seat." He gestured for me to sit as he sunk down into the lotus position himself. "First, you need to understand that there are two types of genjutsu. The first, you cast on the environment. The second, you cast on people."

"So, targeted and area of effect?" I repeated for clarification. He nodded. I had to stop myself from letting my drift off to memories of playing mmorpgs.

(I used to play as a necromancer, and I loved to lure in a bunch of monsters, since I had ridiculously high physical defense for a mage, and then unleash my AoE skills. I missed that game. But I was there to learn about genjutsu, not reminisce about gaming.)

"Exactly. We won't be going too far into area of effect genjutsu, because in practice it should really be called ninjutsu." He lectured.

"What, why?" I asked, fingers dancing across my knees.

"You know the clone jutsu, correct?"

"Yeah. Why? Oh, you mean they function similarly to the clone jutsu?" I guessed.

"Exactly. They create chakra constructs that appears realistic, but you can dispel with contact. _But_ they _are_ tangible, and thus not technically genjutsu."

"But why are they called genjutsu then? And why isn't the clone jutsu considered genjutsu if it works on the same principle as techniques that are considered genjutsu?" My face scrunched up in confusion. (Well, scrunched up by my standards.)

"It's because people consider the chakra constructs illusions, though that's not quite true. As for the clone jutsu, it's a failed iteration of the shadow clone technique. Since it was intended to be a ninjutsu, it was classified as one."

"I suppose that makes sense." I conceded, tapping my fingers together instead of tapping my knee.

"Usually people start with that sort of genjutsu, because while it's really ninjutsu, it's still similar enough to genjutsu that it acts as a midway point to true genjutsu. In fact, type one is as far as most get. But Kushina-nee-chan said to skip it."

"Why?"

"You ask that a lot, don't you?" Shisui-senpai crossed his arms and leaned back slightly. I shrugged a single shoulder in response. "Well, I'm not actually sure. She just said it was a waste for you. Any idea?"

"I see..." I tapped two of my fingers against my chin as I thought. "Probably because of my skew?"

"You mean your chakra is skewed?"

"Yeah."

"What's the ratio?"

"As of the pre-graduation checkup it's sitting at eight physical, ninety two spiritual."

"Holy fucking shit." Shisui gaped at me. "Are you serious?"

"Yes." I crossed my arms and narrowed my eyes. "I have no reason not to be."

"Damn, no wonder she wants us to skip over that." he chuckled. "I've never heard of chakra that skewed. It must be a record."

"It used to be only seven physical." I added helpfully.

"I don't even—fuck, kid. I can't..." he spluttered. "Uh, back on topic, we're going to focus on type two genjutsu.

"First thing to understand is that type two genjutsu is very different, and very few practice it. Outside of the Uchiha clan, the village has maybe four others who are proficient with it, and only one of them could be said to have mastered it. Inside the clan, there's probably about fifty. I mean, there are people who can cast some D- or C-rank type two genjutsu, but that's it."

"Why so few?" It was hard to believe in a village with over twenty thousand ninja had less than sixty practitioners? That was unreal. "Do other villages have more?"

"Well, it's basically because it's extremely difficult, and the true strength in it is to create and cast illusions on the fly. Other villages vary. Mist has a clan of true genjutsu users, but Rock and Sand have very few.

"Anyways, this type of genjutsu works by using your chakra to affect your opponent's brain. Complex preset illusions, like the one I assume they used on you in the academy, are almost never used by a true genjutsu master. We do use simple preset illusions a lot though. For example, there is a genjutsu to affect the targets balance. That one is pretty common, and there are others like it. But anything truly complex needs to be immediately—" Shisui paused as some sort of black bird landed on his shoulder. "—mutable. I'm afraid I must cut things short, I'm needed elsewhere."

"Ah." I nodded in acknowledgement, though I was a bit disappointed. It was an interesting topic.

"In the mean time..." He said, a hand rummaging in his weapons pouch. "You will need this."

He handed me a rectangular piece of steel embedded with three flat, circular stones, each a different colour. I turned it over in my hand and noticed a sequence of numbers across the back of it. "What is this for?"

"This token is what will get you into the D-rank section of the ninja library archives." He replied.

"The... ninja library archives." I repeated, and my lips parted ever so slightly. They _actually_ had a ninja library? I was shocked.

-x-

The ninja library archives were generally just referred to as the archives. They were split into four different buildings across the village. I wasn't sure were the other three were, but the D-rank archives were hidden in the basement of an apartment building for retired ninja and other approved persons.

A very familiar apartment building. The building I spent the first five years of my life in.

Following Shisui-senpai's instructions, I made my way up to the second floor and found the door marked "staff only." Inside was a small, dark room with an elevator at the end. There were no buttons, but there was a slot for the token, which I inserted.

There was a loud clang as bars descended around me, and then clunking and hissing as the elevator descended. When it stopped, the bars rose up again and I found myself facing a woman sitting at a desk.

"Name, rank, sponsors, and token please." She requested tonelessly.

"Hoshino Sekai, genin, Uzumaki Kushina, Uchiha Shisui and Uchiha Itachi." I listed off, handing her my token. She took it, examined the serial number on the back and then touched each of the stones.

"Chakra signatures verified. I'll check the registry." she told me as she pulled out a thick black book. She flipped through it until she found what she was looking for. She compared the token to something in the book, then handed it back.

"Registration valid. You may access the D-rank archives, but are not permitted to remove anything. Food and drink are only allowed in the designated areas. Please keep noise to a minimum." she droned.

As I walked passed her, I noticed she was missing a leg.

The D-rank archives were basically like a science library. There were no jutsu or anything of the sort kept here, just information. And even then, they didn't share anything too advanced. The way I'd describe it is if this were a library of sorts from The Before, you could find a book about chemistry, but you wouldn't find one with information that would help you with creating a bomb. Like, if you took the information from one of the books, and applied it, you could probably make one, but it wouldn't give you instructions, if that makes any sense.

It wasn't surprising that they withheld so much information, even after all the hoops you need to jump through.

The token I had was registered by Shisui-senpai, Itachi-san, and Kushina-sensei with the sensors who worked the front desk, and one of the flat stones was filled with each of their chakra. No one can use the token but me, and they cannot all register any other tokens together.

I was also forbidden from even _mentioning_ the archives to any other ninja outside of the archives themselves. I assume the upper ranks don't have to follow that rule, but a genin like myself was a security risk.

The reason I was given access to the D-rank archives was because to excel at true genjutsu, I needed to understand how the brain worked.

Walking through the stacks, I ignored the temptation of the math texts and worked my way into the neuroscience section to find the texts Shisui-senpai recommended.

-x-

"It's not fair!" Naruto fumed after Sekai left the Uzumaki home. He was standing in the middle of the kitchen while his father did the dishes and his mother was writing up a report at the kitchen table. "She's just a little kid! When I was her age you didn't even let me _start_ the academy! I bet I could take her in a fight, believe it!"

"Naruto." Kushina said his name sternly, turning away from her work to face him. "When other people start the academy and when they graduate is decided by other people. When you start is decided by your father and me, and we both decided it was best for you to start when you were eight. As for my apprentice... She may be younger than you, but she's more skilled. She could beat you."

"No way! That little kid _can't_ be stronger than me, the future hogake!" Naruto shouted back. "And why was it best for me to start at eight, huh? Why wasn't it best for _her_?"

"Naruto, she's stronger than you right now, but you'll catch up, okay?" The redhead attempted to placate her son. The scowl on his face deepened, so she hurried to reassure him further. "She had an earlier start than you did, that's why, okay? You'll catch up, I promise. And she had that earlier start because she's an orphan, and it was her own decision to do so. If I'd had any say, she wouldn't have started so early, but it's out of my hands."

Naruto huffed and stomped his foot. "But _why?_ " he repeated. " _Why_ was is best for me to only start at eight?"

"Because war was coming." Minato, who had just finished the dishes, said. "And now it's already been going on for almost two years. We wanted to keep you off the battlefield for as long as possible, to let you have as much of a childhood as we could."

"So what if there was a war coming! Why do you want me off the battlefield? I could have been out there kicking ass and the war would already be over if you let me start earlier!" Naruto protested.

Kushina shot Minato a look that seemed to say _look what you've done now_. "Naruto, even if we _did_ let you start earlier, you'd still be only a genin, and you wouldn't be strong enough to make a difference yet, to battle enemy jounin. It takes _years_ of hard work to be strong enough to make a real difference on a battlefield."

"Whatever! You're wrong! I _could_ make a difference!" Naruto snarled, turning his back on his parents. He stomped up the stairs, and shortly afterwards Minato and Kushina heard a loud slam.

"Why did you have to go and say that?" Kushina hissed at her husband.

"He deserved the truth, 'Shina." Minato said softly.

"Don't you "'Shina" me!" she snarled, her hair rising around her in her fury. "He has no understanding of why we don't want him to go to war until it's absolutely necessary! He doesn't understand it's not all glory and adventure and saving people! And he just proved it!"

"Kushina, if you didn't shelter him so much—"

She barked out a laugh. " _Me_ shelter him? You've sheltered him just as much as I have!"

"Oh really? Who decided—"

The argument between the blond and the redhead wouldn't end any time soon.

-x-

Notes: Tsunade is more powerful than Kakashi, so the bit about holding/dropping the bells was added to handicap her. Her intention was that if she dropped the bells, she'd call a draw, but she didn't say that out loud, so team four didn't know that.

The "freeze tag" seal is a type of barrier seal that Sekai created. It forms a thin, invisible, barrier around the target to prevent them from moving. She calls it "freeze tag" in reference to the game.

To be clear about Whirling Tides, the assailants targeted the Uzumaki primarily, resulting in only a handful of survivors. The other clans weren't hunted down the same way when they fled, therefore more survivors to make it to Leaf.

Regarding population, I took the numbers given in canon for the total allied forces in the war arc, then looked at the population ranks of each major village from the databooks to split that proportionally, and then added in the civilian population with numbers that made sense to me. For the Uchiha clan, I decided to make them so large because in canon the rebellion of them was apparently a viable threat to the village. I'll post more regarding the subject on the sekai-against-the-world tumblr eventually.

I decided to take the fanon "clone jutsu is really a genjutsu" and turn it into "some genjutsu is really _ninjutsu_ " because I love being contrary like that with fanon I find stupid, or that goes against canon.

I chose an apartment building for the archives because I was like "What sort of large building has people coming and going that is not a business of sorts?" And voila! An apartment building. You have tenants and guests coming and going. But that's not terribly secure if _anyone_ can move in. So it's subsidized housing for retired ninja, and other approved persons.

This was updated so quickly because the genjutsu/library scene and the meeting of the Uzumaki family scene were already written. The chapter cover/page thing for 503 says "a scene from the _Uzumaki_ family's daily morning ritual," which is why I had Minato take the name Uzumaki.

Thank you all for the reviews! Six and i got only like, three reviews, but then after posting Seven I got nearly thirty! Thank you all so much for your support

The Mathemagician

P.S. Sorry for the length of the notes on this chapter


	11. Nine

Against The World

"You can trust someone with your life, but not your secrets."

-x-

I didn't realize anything was wrong at first. I woke up from my nap, and assumed mother was still sleeping, so I opted not to disturb her, and pulled out the math books Hanako had given me before she moved to the hospice. It was high school level math, but it was better than nothing, and it was my goal to do every question in the textbook.

I was broken out of my work by the growling of my stomach. A quick glance at the clock told me it was nearly midnight—well past dinner time. I frowned. While mother often took a nap after a long shift, she was usually awake in time to make dinner for the two of us.

I put aside my textbook and papers and made my way to mother's bedroom door. I knocked, and let myself in when there was no answer.

The door caught on something, and when I turned on the light, I saw it was her work uniform, which was stained, presumably from the soup that was spilled on her. I kicked it away. When I reached mother's bed, I noticed something was off. She was tucked under the covers with only her head and shoulders visible, but there was a strange, angry red mark on her neck.

"Mother?" I murmured, reaching for her, only to find that her skin was cold. I pulled my hand back. Something in my chest tightened. "M-mother? Mother!"

Hesitantly, I moved my hand to her neck. There was no pulse.

"No..." I shook my head. "No. No! No, no, no... This—this isn't happening! What happened—this doesn't..."

I pulled the blanket away from her, and inhaled sharply. Mother hadn't bothered with proper pyjamas, and was just wearing a tank top and underwear, so the red, puffy welts across her legs and shoulders were on display. I pulled up her top slightly, and found the welts present on her stomach as well.

I backed away, shaking my head in denial, and tripped on mother's uniform. I hit the ground hard, but I ignored the pain, and clumsily stood back up.

I took a deep breath, and left the room. "I—how—what... What do I do...?" I asked myself. I wasn't prepared for something like this. Prepared to find my mother's _corpse_.

"I want Hanako... She would know what to do... What do I... I need to tell someone. Yes. I need—help. I need help." I rambled. "But who? Who... neighbours. Yes. Neighbours. Right. Okay."

There was no answer from the first two doors I knocked on, but fortunately a young woman answered on my third try. ( _Third time's the charm!_ I thought hysterically.)

"Can I help you?" she asked hoarsely, her voice sounded like she'd been coughing, and though her tone was polite, it was obvious she didn't want to be bothered.

"Y-yes. I, um." I licked my lips. "I live a few doors down... with mother... but—I... Uh..."

The woman's demeanor immediately changed from distant to concerned. "Are you okay, sweetie?" she inquired, crouching down to my level.

"No. My... mother—she's dead. I think she's dead and I don't know what to do."

The woman's already pale face turned white, and she stood back up to her full height. "Can you take me to her, sweetie?"

She held out her hand. I took it.

-x-

Nine

Shortly after I started spending my evenings in the archives, I learned from listening to other people in them that in the C-rank archives, they had basic personnel files and more information about department heads. Apparently there was nothing classified there, but I didn't need that at the moment—I just needed their faces, and I was more likely to find photos there than anywhere else.

The C-rank archives could be a huge help in figuring out the identity of my father.

I also learned that they are open only to chuunin and above, and chuunin still needed two jounin sponsors. Which meant that unless I found a different lead, I was stuck until I was promoted.

It was disappointing that I couldn't pursue my lead, but the feeling was outweighed by the fact that I had a direction to go in, instead of wandering around aimlessly waiting for information to just fall in my lap.

Sometimes, I wondered if I should even bother looking for my father. He obviously wasn't a good person—he raped my mother, because he was a ninja and had the power to, and my mother was a civilian who couldn't do anything about it.

If he _was_ important, and arranging things for my benefit, who cared? It helped me get ahead in this godforsaken world.

But I dismissed my doubts about searching for my father every time they passed through my mind, using the argument that if he was powerful, he could at some point make things worse for me, to justify my burning curiosity.

-x-

I hated the fact that I couldn't take anything out of the library. Reading and studying while sitting still would only hinder me in trying to improve my imbalance, but there was nothing I could do about it but push myself harder physically in my training.

It didn't help that I kept getting side tracked by the math section. I was curious about how advanced math was in this world, and was pleased to see they weren't too far behind The Before. I couldn't help but pick up some of the books to review material I had covered in my first two years of post-secondary education. I was disappointed to realize how much I had forgotten, and ended up taking notes in the notebook meant for my study of the brain until it was full of definitions, theorems, proofs, and exercises to work on in my spare time.

Ah, real analysis and linear algebra, how I had missed you.

Suffice to say, it took me awhile to actually learn about the brain. A lot of the information was review—I'd learned a lot of it back in high school in The Before, but it was review I needed.

I wasn't sure how much I needed to know for genjutsu. I knew the parts of the brain, about the cerebral cortex and the four lobes... But did I need to know the excruciating, boring details of _precisely_ how all that worked?

And I didn't even have anyone to ask—Kushina-sensei knew how to break out of genjutsu and a couple type one genjutsu, but she knew fuck all about true, type two genjutsu, and Shisui-senpai and the other person sensei recruited weren't in the village. I think senpai said the other guy was his cousin, Taichi or something? It didn't really matter.

After a lot of deliberation, I resigned myself to studying the tedious details, deciding it was better to know too much than too little.

 _Besides,_ I told myself. _I can justify studying and copying the math texts as a reward for my hard work_.

-x-

It was six weeks after graduation when they assigned team four our first C-rank mission.

Aiko, Sakura, and I were excited to finally do something other than D-ranks. We'd done quite a few of them, and all of them were as annoying as our first. A C-rank was a welcome change, and this time it was Kushina-sensei leading the mission.

"This should be a pretty quick mission, girls." Our redheaded sensei said with a smile. "We'll be leaving the village, so take your mission packs, just in case. Meet me at the north-east gates in thirty minutes, okay?"

"Yes, Kushina-sensei." The three of us chorused.

With that, the four of us went our separate ways to prepare for the mission. Aiko and Sakura presumably returned to their homes, and I assumed Kushina-sensei had jounin things to take care of before we departed. As for myself, I had all the supplies I needed sealed away in my left arm, so I opted to head straight for the gates.

While I waited for the rest of team four to arrive, I pulled out my math notes and a pencil from my storage seal and placed them on the ground, so I could position myself over them and do one-armed push ups while I practised evaluating triple integrals.

"What are you doing?" Sakura asked when she arrived, looming over my shoulder.

"Triple integrals." I told her. I could practically hear her confusion, though she didn't say anything. "It's math. Multi-variable calculus."

"You can do calculus? And triple integrals?" Sakura's tone was incredulous. "I don't even know what a single integral is."

"Well, given a function f of x that is continuous on the closed interval—"

"I don't think she actually wanted to know, Sekai-chan, or that she even cares." Aiko interrupted. "And I don't really care either."

"W-well, I wouldn't say _that,_ exactly..." Sakura argued weakly.

"Yeah, you're still too polite to say it outright like that," My bespectacled teammate acknowledged. "But it's what you're thinking." Sakura flushed. "Relax, you don't need to worry about offending us or hurting our feelings, or just being rude. Sekai-chan may be quiet a lot of the time, but she can be mean as hell, and man, is it hilarious! And I'm her only friend, so I've learned to let the mean comments go, since when it's me she doesn't really mean them."

"Really? I find that hard to believe."

"One time, Sekai-chan was stuck partnering with this one guy, right? And he was a complete moron. He asked some stupid question about chakra—I don't remember what, and Sekai-chan just stared at him for a moment until he asked if she heard him. She told him that yes, she did, it just took her a moment to comprehend how stupid he was." Aiko recalled.

"I said it took me awhile to comprehend how much the human race was failing, if it produced someone as moronic as him." I corrected. "And then I asked if his parents were siblings."

"Close enough" the blonde dismissed. "Point is, she _slays_."

"A shame you're not a mind reader." I commented as I packed up my study materials. "Then as long as you had me around, you'd never be bored."

"I don't need to read your mind to avoid boredom—I just need to set you free in a building full of idiots and watch what happens." Aiko retorted.

"Set who free in a building of idiots?" A cheerful voice interrupted, startling us.

"Kushina-sesnei!" Sakura squeaked. "Where did you come from?"

"Well," Kushina drawled. "I originally come from Whirlpool count—"

I snorted. "Mission?"

"Ah, right." she rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly. "I suppose I ought to give you lot an overview of what we'll be doing.

"There's a small watch station about one hundred and fifty kilometres from here. Our job," Sensei reached behind her, into her waist pouch, and produced four scrolls. "Is to deliver these."

"Scrolls?" Aiko wrinkled her brow.

"They contain basic supplies for the watch station."

"So we're just doing a long distance pigeon mission this time." Aiko scowled.

"Pigeon mission?" Kushina gave her a strange look.

"Like carrier pigeons."

"Carrier pigeon? Do you mean, like, the hawks we send out with messages—messenger hawks? Except a pigeon...?" Kushina-sensei looked utterly baffled. "But who'd use a pigeon to send messages... that's a bit strange... unless it's a summon?"

"I don't know!" Aiko huffed. Her arms were crossed and she was fighting a blush. "Sekai-chan came up with the name for them! Ask her!"

I blinked. I hadn't realized that carrier pigeons weren't ever a thing here. Since this world actually sends messages with fucking _birds_ , I figured it was.

"I had a dream about it." I lied.

"A dream." Aiko repeated. "You're really weird, you know that?"

"I am well aware."

She didn't know the half of it.

-x-

When sensei said it wouldn't take long, I think she wasn't aware of how slow my teammates were. Not that they were slow for genin, but Kushina-sensei was _fast_ , even for a jounin. I was pretty fast too, with respect to my rank. If it had just been the two of us, we probably could have shaved a lot of time off the trip, but alas, neither Aiko nor Sakura were able to keep up with such a pace.

The other two members of team four had substandard speed and stamina—not horrible, but it was a bit below average. So we let them set the pace, and so it took us just over three and a half hours to reach the watch station.

Upon our arrival, Kushina-sensei sent us to the mess hall to rest up while she met with the jounin in charge.

The mess hall was mostly empty, but for a handful of older ninja scattered about in small groups. Most of them looked to be at least twice my age, if not more, and the ones that looked at us when we entered seemed to wonder what three little girls were doing there. I ignored them, and led Sakura and Aiko to an unoccupied table. As soon as I was seated my fingers started to tap against the bench. I felt slightly ridiculous at the table—the top of it was nearly as tall as my shoulders.

"Why are they looking at us?" Sakura muttered.

"Because I look like a three year old." I replied dryly. That was a slight exaggeration, but I _was_ very small for a seven year old, and could easily pass for a five year old. Still, the comment seemed to relax Aiko and Sakura, which was my intention.

I had no idea what to do or say next, so I took out my canteen and chugged down a litre of water to avoid speaking.

"...Do you have any left, Sekai-chan?" Sakura inquired hesitantly. "I drank all mine and I'm not comfortable going to get a refill with all those guys over there."

Well, I certainly had enough to share. "Pass your canteen." She handed it over, and I poured all the water in my canteen into hers.

"You don't have to give me all of it!" Sakura protested.

I ignored her and asked Aiko to pass hers. Once Aiko's was in hand, I poured water into hers as well.

"What." Aiko said. "How did you—I just saw you empty it!"

Mentally, I smirked. "I have a seal at the bottom. I have about thirty-six litres of water stored away, and when my canteen runs dry, it automatically refills."

"And it's even cold!" Sakura added.

"That's so cool!" Aiko marvelled, and took a sip. "Sekai-chan, if it's not too much trouble..." She bit her lip. "Could you make one for me? And Sakura-chan?"

I blinked, surprised at the request. With a mental shrug, I figured _Why not?_ And nodded.

-x-

A few hours later, Kushina-sensei entered the mess hall, which was nearly empty aside from the three of us. She led us up to the serving station, and pulled our four numbered boxes from the fridge. She grabbed a clip board that was hanging on the side of the fridge and wrote out each of our registration numbers beside the numbers corresponding to the ones on the boxes.

"They're very strict with supplies—everything has to be accounted for, including who took what." She explained as she handed out our meals. "Any discrepancies can lead to a formal reprimand for anyone who's been here since the last inventory. _Never_ take something without recording it."

Opening the box, I found a bowl of rice with some sort of (mystery) meat and vegetables on top. It didn't look appetizing, but I went to warm it up with my teammates anyway.

After the first few bits, I found it didn't taste appetizing either, but I forced my self to finish it, so as to not waste food. I mentally made a note to cook up several large meals, then portion them and seal them away.

After eating, we signed ourselves out of the encampment and took off towards home.

The trip back took even longer, as my teammates hadn't fully recovered from the trip out. By the time we reached the village, the sun was setting.

My teammates each handed me their canteens, and sensei blessedly allowed us to go straight home, instead of going with her to report the mission complete.

I wasn't tired from the trip, exactly, but it was a long day and I was happy to go home.

Once inside, I stripped down to a t-shirt and underwear, and got to work on their canteens. The seal itself wasn't too difficult, but it was tricky to draw it on the bottom of a relatively tall and narrow object.

Using a long, thin needle dipped in sealing ink, I carefully drew out the seal. Despite my best efforts, I messed up and had to restart twice, but I got them done. From there I set the seal to intake, and brought the canteens to my sink, where I proceeded to slowly fill with water over and over again. It was monotonous, but it was something you did for your friends.

My brow furrowed. Friends. I've thought of Aiko as a friend for quite awhile, but it seemed that Sakura wormed her way into that category as well.

It was baffling to me—I didn't do the whole friend thing, really. I mean, not _real_ friendships. There was never anyone I felt I could trust or talk to about my problems.

But now, in this life, there are two of them.

I had always considered this life, this world, to be horrible. To be a dystopia compared to The Before. But despite how horrible this culture of murder and war is, I supposed there were a few good points.

Even if there were still things I'd never speak about with those good points.

-x-

My next genjutsu lesson wasn't with Shisui-senpai, but his cousin, Itachi-senpai. While Shisui-senpai had been rather cheerful and expressive, Itachi-senpai was quite stoic. His hair was a shade lighter than his cousin's, and was long and straight, held back in a thin ponytail. His eyes were the same black colour, but he had deep bags below them, giving him a permanently exhausted look.

If I had to guess, I'd say he was constantly stressed and had too many expectations placed upon him. It almost made me feel guilty for taking up his time, but I consoled myself by believing that teaching genjutsu is probably more relaxing and less strenuous than most of the things he has to do.

Shisui-senpai had left him notes on what he'd been able to cover with me and what he'd asked of me a couple of weeks ago, so the first thing Itachi-senpai did after introductions was quiz me.

"Each cerebral hemisphere consists of which lobes?"

"Frontal, parietal, occipital, temporal, and insular."

"Which of those is secondary?"

"The insular lobe."

"Largest?"

"Frontal. It occupies about one third of the hemisphere."

"The thalamus is important in..."

"Sensory motor integration and speech-language functions."

"Functions of the parietal lobs?"

"Spatial computation, body orientation and awareness."

And on and on it went...

"Which chemical has bearing on the body's ability to experience pain and pleasure?"

"Dopamine."

"Which chemical is responsible for arousal and alertness?"

"Norepinephrine."

Senpai nodded. "Well done, you were able to correctly answer the entire list of questions, Sekai-chan. We can proceed to discussing how to use your chakra to manipulate the pathways in the brain..."

The ensuing lecture was long, but fascinating. He discussed how to use your chakra to stimulate the production of various brain chemicals, and how to interfere with executive functions.

Apparently, there was a lot more to genjutsu than visual illusions. You can affect mood, hearing, spatial computation, judgment, and even things like a person's breathing.

 _You could use genjutsu to stop someone's heart._

 _You could convince them that they're breathing when they_ aren't _._

 _ **You could be in complete control of every bodily process**_ **.**

The power of genjutsu... It was phenomenal. I _definitely_ needed to learn it.

Even if most of those things were incredibly difficult to do and required years of training and excellent chakra control, as senpai said.

 _I would do it_.

-x-

After that first C-rank, we started taking more and more of them, to the point that we rarely took D-ranks anymore. A lot of them were pigeon missions, but not all of them. Once we were sent out to help clear an important trade route that fell victim to a landslide, and we also played bodyguard to someone travelling all the way to Red Bean Country. Usually they don't send genin on bodyguard missions because of the war, but since Red Bean is south east of the village and most of the fighting is to the west or north, it was deemed safe enough. That mission took us nearly a month.

But after months of missions, I finally had saved up enough money for shopping. And so I found myself wandering through the business district with Aiko and Sakura.

"Alright, Sekai, clothes or home items first?" Aiko inquired.

"Clothes are a more urgent necessity." I decided.

"Why? It's not like you've grown." Aiko teased.

"I'm still wearing clothes from the orphanage—I want my own." I replied, though I doubted she wanted one.

"Makes sense." Sakura agreed with a nod. "I usually go to Needles and Wire. They have a good selection."

"Mine are clan produced, so I can't really help you with recommending a place," Aiko admitted with a small shrug. "But Sakura's clothes are good quality, so we might as well go there."

"Very well then." I said with a nod, and gestured for Sakura to lead us to the store.

Compared to Ninja Outfitters, one of the biggest names in the industry even though their wares were of mediocre quality, Needles and Wire was fairly small. The building was white, with a faded sign over the door, and a small display window.

Sakura ushered me inside, and bells jingled as I stepped inside.

"Ah, Little Haruno!" An old woman crowed in a hoarse voice as she stepped out of a back room. "Back so soon? And you brought friends!"

"Hi Arima-baa-san. My friend Sekai here needs an entire wardrobe." Sakura told the woman.

"Is that so?" The woman hummed. "I'm not sure I have much field quality clothes that size—mostly just lower quality merchandise for academy kids."

"Oh." Sakura faltered. "I'm sorry then, I guess we'll have to check elsewhere."

"Oh no, Little Haruno, you and your friend browse around the store and find what sort of thing you like, and I'll do a custom order for your friend." The woman protested. "That is, unless she needs them right away?"

"No, I can wait." I assured the old lady. "I appreciate your willingness to accommodate my... stature."

"Oh, think nothing of it!" She dismissed. "Little Haruno's family has shopped here for ages, doing a custom order for her friend is the least I can do to repay that loyalty. Just grab things that you like and I can make them in your size. Bring them up to the counter when you're done, alright, little ninja?"

"Thank you, ma'am." I bowed to her in gratitude.

"Oh, you can just call me Arima-san, dear! None of this ma'am business, alright?"

"Of course, Arima-san."

"C'mon then," Aiko declared. "Let's browse!"

With Aiko and Sakura trailing behind me, I wandered down the aisles, taking note of what my options were as I went. After a bit of deliberation, I picked out a set of mesh armour to protect my torso, a thick, hooded vest, both a long sleeved and a short sleeved t-shirt, a pair each of cargo shorts and pants, and a pair of slightly taller ninja sandals.

With things picked out, my friends and I approached the counter and Arima-san came bustling out of the backroom again.

"I should have just told you to bring it back to me, instead of the counter. Oh well, follow me please." She said.

I nodded and followed her down to the back room, which turned out to be a workshop. Arima-san gestured me to stand on a tall stool. "Come along, dear. I need to measure you up!"

I stepped up, and then a measuring tape was flying around me faster than I'd expected from a civilian. "Hm... You're small, but young." She commented. "You'll be growing a bit for awhile, so I'll make things that will fit alright even if you grow a few centimetres..."

She gestured me to step down, and then asked if I had any colour preferences. "Perhaps to match such beautiful hair?" she suggested.

"The shirts can match my hair." I said after briefly contemplating the matter. "But the rest should be black."

"Of course, of course." Arima-san nodded eagerly. "Now, how many of each would you like?"

"Three pairs of shorts, one pair of pants, three short sleeved shirts, two long sleeved ones, and one each of the mesh, vest, and sandals."

"Alright, little ninja. It should be ready in about two weeks. Do you want to pay now, or later?"

I decided to pay right away, so I didn't have to worry about overspending at the next shop.

Once everything was hashed out, the three of us left the store, Sakura calling out a fond farewell as she stepped out the door.

"They seem to know you well, there." Aiko commented, looking at Sakura out of the corner of her eyes.

"Ah, well..." Sakura's cheeks reddened. "My grandmother was her first customer. And ever sine then my family has shopped there, so she knows us quite well. Two of her grandnieces work there too, as her apprentices, and we're quite familiar with them as well. Sometimes they give us special deals and favours."

"Wow, really?" Aiko's eyes widened. "That must be really nice!"

"Thank you, Sakura." I told my blushing teammate. "I appreciate you bringing me."

"Of course!" She smiled. "Where to now? I don't exactly know anything about buying furniture. Do either of you?"

Aiko and I both shook our heads. While I had experience doing it in The Before, I wasn't really sure about things here. A lot of things were different. For example, there wasn't mass production on the scale of The Before, so there were usually only a few pieces that were the same.

So from there, we decided to wander the business district and just wing it.

-x-

"Thank you so much, Sekai-chan!" Sakura squealed when the aforementioned girl handed back the modified canteens to both the pinkette and blonde, with instructions on how to refill the seal when the water supply runs out. "I really appreciate it!"

"Me too!" Aiko added. "Thanks Sekai-chan!"

Sekai shifted awkwardly, and mumbled incomprehensibly.

"What was that?" Aiko prodded.

"I said... you're my friends, so you can just call me Sekai... Since I don't really bother with them anyway, for you guys... Honorifics, I mean..." Sekai offered awkwardly.

Aiko felt a burst of warm affection fill her. After a year of friendship, her best friend gave her permission to drop honorifics. It felt like a major milestone in their relationship, to the blonde. Sekai tended to be a rather closed off and solitary girl, someone hard to get close to.

But at that moment, Aiko knew she'd managed to worm her way past the cold exterior and into the younger girl's heart, knew that Sekai trusted her, and cared about Aiko as much as she cared about Sekai. It was a wonderful feeling.

But a small part of her couldn't help but feel just the tiniest bit jealous of their other teammate, who managed to earn the same privilege in only a few months.

-x-

Notes: Just some world building and character development in this chapter. Sekai is very introverted, and doesn't let many people get close to her, especially now that she's in the Naruto world, so it was pretty significant for her to acknowledge Sakura and Aiko as her friends.

Oh, and we get an idea of how Sekai's mom died. This scene takes place directly after the intro scene of Eight.

For a sense of timeline, Sekai graduated in April, and by the end of this chapter it is September. So she's been a genin for about six months.

Any who, so I tried to look around about how fast ninja can run, and all I could really find was speculation of about 60 km/h. Jounin can run probably up to 80km/h, I decided, and that's if they're fast even for a jounin. I decided team four probably ran at about 45 km/h.

Since like thread, wire is thin, though much stronger, so to I called the store "Needles and Wire" to symbolize the strength/durability of the clothes. Or something. Mostly I just suck at naming things...

I got my information on the brain from a couple of websites, and the book "Neuroscience For the Study of Communicative Disorders, second edition" by Subhash C. Bhatnager, which I found laying around my mum's place. It was a lucky find. Any inaccuracies are probably from the websites.

Genjutsu apparently works by manipulating the chakra flow in the brain. Considering the brain is literally responsible for _everything_ , I figure you could use genjutsu to interfere with anything the brain controls, not just seeing things or hearing things. That said, those will be things only the very best of the best can do, and isn't something that can be done on a large scale. So it could be used for say, assassination, but wouldn't be very effective on a large scale battlefield.

Thanks for all the reviews, favourites, and follows everyone,

The Mathemagician


	12. Ten

Against the World

"Forgiving... was a mistake."

-x-

Aiko watched me closely as I pulled back the left sleeve of my t-shirt and secured it in place with a thin needle.

Next, using clear ink, I primed my left arm and both sides of a piece of paper with clear sealing ink. I let the clear ink dry until it was sticky, and then pressed the paper over my storage seal, which I had emptied just a few hours before. I held my hand over it, and using my chakra, I grabbed at the storage seal.

I grunted in pain, but it didn't hurt as much as when I drew the seal onto my arm. "Are you okay, Sekai-chan?" Aiko asked me. I nodded, because I _was,_ but that didn't seem to appease her, judging from the way she chewed on her bottom lip.

Once my chakra had a good grip on the seal, I yanked, and then slowly pulled the paper away from arm, leaving my arm clean, and the storage seal transferred to the paper.

I flexed my arm, making sure that nothing had gone wrong.

"Thanks for watching me, Aiko." I told my companion. "It's not recommended to try this alone if you haven't done it before."

"Of course." Aiko responded with a smile. "But... What exactly happened?"

"I developed a much more secure storage seal, and wanted to replace my old seal with it. So I had to remove the original seal from my arm." I explained. "To do this, I needed to coat my arm and the paper with clear sealing ink, to facilitate the transfer of the seal from my arm to the paper. The sealing ink coating the paper and my arm allowed me to grab the seal on my arm with my chakra, and pull it off onto a new medium, the paper. It's dangerous if done wrong, which was why I had you watching me, so you could take me to the hospital if anything went wrong. But despite the danger, it is the most efficient way to remove a seal from flesh."

"That's pretty cool, Sekai-chan." Aiko said in admiration. "That has to be a super high level technique, though."

"It's a B-rank supplementary sealing technique." I informed her.

"You can already do B-rank techniques?" The blonde's eyes widened in further awe. "That's amazing—we haven't even graduated yet!"

The corner of my mouth twitched in amusement. I was pretty awesome, wasn't I? Now I just needed to remove the seal on my thigh.

-x-

Ten

Dinner at the Uzumaki household had become a weekly ritual. Usually we went straight to Kushina-sensei's house after training, but often enough training ended a bit early and we stopped in the market and bought ingredients for the meal sensei would teach me to prepare.

It had become a fairly comfortable routine, and the blue house in the Senju district became a second home to me. Sensei had even given me my own room there. I rarely used it, but the gesture meant a lot to me.

On this particular warm September day, Kushina-sensei was teaching me her secret ramen recipe.

"The three of us love ramen," Kushina-sensei explained as we walked to her home from the market. "Naruto would eat a dozen bowls in one sitting if we let him, and Minato is quite fond of it too, though not to the extent Naruto and I are."

"I've only ever had instant." I admitted to her.

She gasped loudly, and stared at me in exaggerated disbelief. "Oh, you poor dear!" she wailed, throwing her arms around me. I froze as she awkwardly held me. "You've never had real ramen in your entire life?!"

I shook my head.

"Well, it's a good thing I'm teaching you my super secret recipe, then! You'll love it, I promise! Now let's go! No time to waste!" Kushina-sensei released me, and I refrained from pointing out _she_ was the one who had stopped us in the first place.

Sensei unlocked the door, and we stepped inside. I slipped out of my sandals and into a pair of purple bunny slippers, then dutifully followed the redhead to the kitchen, where she immediately put me to work.

Despite my distaste for cooking, I actually found making the noodles quite enjoyable, though preparing the soup base was as boring as cooking usually was.

Despite everything I'd learned here, I still hated the task, though I knew the importance of it, especially since I lived alone. But I still felt that it was the most boring of tasks. Wait for this to boil, stir that occasionally, watch the frying pan and flip when necessary. It was such boring, thoughtless work, but I had to pay attention to the boring, thoughtless work.

I had to admit, cooking with sensei _did_ make it more tolerable, but still, by the time Minato-san and her son, who I had dubbed "The Nuisance," arrived, I was glad to finally eat.

"What do you think, Sekai-chan?" Minato-san asked. "Kushina told me this is your first time having real ramen."

"EH!?" The Nuisance exclaimed, noddles dropping from his mouth. "You haven't had ramen before!? But it's the best food ever!"

"Good." I answered, ignoring The Nuisance. It was a bit of an exaggeration, to be honest. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't really as great as I'd expected from the way sensei talked about it. Perhaps other flavours were better?

"You need to slurp it!" Kushina-sensei enthused. "Ramen tastes best when you do—there's no other way to eat it!"

Mentally, I cringed, but did as she suggested. While I had gathered it wasn't considered rude to do so in this context, I felt uncomfortable slurping food when I wasn't alone.

"See?" she chirped. "Didn't that taste even better?"

I nodded even though I hadn't noticed any difference.

"So what is the plan for tomorrow, Sekai-chan?" Minato-san asked me. He always tried to get me to talk more, and knowing his wife was going to be away for awhile practically handed him a topic, since I couldn't say that sensei would know better than me.

"Training with Kairi-sensei."

"Oh? What will she be working on?" he prompted.

I shrugged, and went back to my ramen, conversation over.

"I think Kakashi will be here for dinner next week." he tried, knowing that I liked Kakashi-senpai, though he'd only been present once or twice since my first meal with the family. He was intelligent, and I liked his trollish personality.

Unfortunately for Minato-san, it wasn't my attention he caught.

"Kakashi-nii is coming?" The Nuisance exclaimed, bouncing in his chair. "I haven't seen him in _forever_! When will he be back? For how long? Where has he been?"

Ah, well, while the kid was a bother, at least he took the focus off of me.

-x-

"Stealth," Kairi-sensei began, her navy hair hanging in her face like usual. "Is an incredibly important skill that every ninja should be trained in. Unfortunately, most don't bother with anything beyond the basics. That will not be the case for the three of you, do you understand?"

"Yes, Kairi-sensei." We replied as we did our exercises. Whenever one of our sensei was lecturing, we were to go through a simple exercise routine until she was done.

"Good. Stealth has many applications—breaking and entering, hiding, escaping, ambushing, spying. Anyone who says they don't need stealth is a moron of the highest order." She lectured. "There are many factors you need to take into account when practising stealth..."

After giving us tips on how to move silently, how to remain unseen, and things to be careful of, Kairi-sensei left the three of us alone to work on a stealth exercise. The exercise, of course, amounted to glorified hide and seek, but I wasn't going to complain.

At first, it was easy enough for all of us to find each other—now that we knew what subtle signs a person left, but after each round we discussed what gave each other away, and how to avoid it.

We had to be careful of leaving behind footprints, of stepping on plants and of causing things in our environment to move, like shaking branches or swaying cloth. We had to move silently, quickly. If the seeker approached, we learned to run away without doing anything to draw their attention. It was a lot of fun.

Hide and seek became part of our daily training routine, and soon it was no longer the seeker that had the easier job, but the hiders. Every other day Kairi-sensei joined us and gave us further tips for improvement and taught us new ways we could be tracked.

"The biggest threat to stealth is scent." Kairi-sensei explained. "And sadly there's not much to be done about it—there is nothing that can completely hide your scent from a sensitive nose.

"If you're being tracked, head to water. Either hide in the water until it's clear, or if you can, discreetly travel through it.

"Once Sekai has improved with her genjutsu, she may be able to fool a nearby scent tracker, but that's a bit far off. Sekai-chan, you will find that genjutsu can have some use in stealth, but you mustn't rely on it—it only works if someone is immediately near you, and you often end up leaving tracks behind you if you're not mindful. For now you won't be using it for stealth training. Understood?"

"Yes, Kairi-sensei." I agreed. It wasn't like I knew any genjutsu yet—Shisui-senpai and Itachi-senpai were still going over theory with me.

"Good. Now, today is a test—you have to hide from _me_."

-x-

I stood outside the doors of the hospice Hanako resided in, staring at the building blankly. It had been months since I'd come to visit her.

 _I've been busy._ I told myself, but I knew that wasn't the reason. After finding out she'd been lying to me, I avoided her.

A few weeks back Kushina-sensei mentioned that she heard I hadn't been by to see Hanako in ages, and "suggested" that I go visit her, practically guilting me into it. I'd put it off, but the guilt just kept getting worse.

So here I was.

Would I tell her I knew she had been lying to me? That I was avoiding her?

Right. That wasn't happening. I would stick to the "too busy and tired" excuse.

With a deep breath I stepped into the familiar building and was greeted by the sterile scent I was no longer used to. I signed in, and made my way to room 1412. Just as I was about to knock on the door, it opened, revealing a middle aged man.

His short hair was greying, and his eyes were the same colour as Hanako's. He wore simple, but high quality clothes.

"Oh, pardon me." He said. He looked me over, and his expression changed, though I wasn't sure what it meant. "You must be Sekai-chan. Hanako has told me so much about you."

I inclined my head, unsure of how to proceed. Never had I seen anyone else visit Hanako, and I had no idea who this man was.

His lips twitched. "Well, Sekai-chan, it's been a pleasure, but I'm afraid I'm already running late. If you'll excuse me..."

I stepped aside, and he strode passed me, looking at me over his shoulder as he left. I stared at his back, fixated on the crest carefully stitched on his back.

Hanako was disowned, so what was a Tominaga doing visiting her?

Mentally, I shrugged, and walked into Hanako's room. It wasn't really my business.

"Sekai-chan!" Hanako beamed at me, her wrinkled face lighting up with joy, and she looked like she lost half a decade. Guilt twisted in my stomach. Regardless of her lies, and whatever her reasons for them, her expression made it clear she loved me.

"Hanako-baa-san." I greeted with a small smile, using her preferred form of address without prompting. It was the least I could do after avoiding her for so long.

"It's so lovely to see you again, my dear. Come, sit." She said, patting the chair beside her bed.

"No work today?" I asked as I took the seat beside her, noticing that her usual pile of paper work was absent.

"I'm taking a break for now," she replied. "I caught the flu awhile ago and I'm still recovering."

"Are you okay, though?"

"Yes, yes. I'm fine," she assured me. "I'm just a bit tired. You know how these things tire me."

I nodded, remembering the last time she'd been ill—it had taken her ages to get better. I bit my lip. Had Kushina-sensei known Hanako was sick? Was that why she wanted me to visit?

I was a horrible person. Hanako had been sick, and I left her all alone, I hadn't been there because she had lied to me about something that, in the great scheme of things, didn't really matter.

Maybe her motives for helping my mother and I weren't what she said, but was it really that big of a deal? Maybe she just didn't want us to know why she'd been disowned.

"I'm sorry." I mumbled. "I should have come sooner."

"Don't worry about it, dear." She smiled warmly. "You've been busy, I'm sure. They must be running you ragged."

"Yeah." I agreed. "But I should have made time—you shouldn't have been alone." I paused. "Aside from that man..."

Hanako chuckled. "I was wondering when you'd ask. That was my younger brother, Junichi."

"...As in Tominaga Junichi, the _clan head_?" My eyes widened slightly in surprise.

"Indeed." Hanako confirmed.

"He's a bit young to be your brother," I muttered. "I didn't know you were from the main line."

Hanako smiled sadly. "My parents needed an heir after I was disowned."

"What was he doing here?"

"Jun-kun has always been rebellious. When he was a teenager, he sought me out, wanting to meet his big sister. We were hardly close, but... he always did consider me family, which is more than I can say about anyone else in that damn clan." She explained. "We grew closer in recent years, and he does his best to help me when he can. He stops by when he can, lately."

"Lately?" I asked, seeking clarification. As far as I'd been aware I was Hanako's only visitor.

"In the past six months he's started to visit. Before that he came once or twice." Hanako elaborated.

"I see..."

"Anyways, why don't you tell me how you've been, Sekai-chan? About what you've been up to?"

-x-

Sadly, my next genjutsu lesson was far from learning to stop people's hearts, but at least we were moving beyond theory.

Instead, Itachi-senpai was showing me a few useful, preset illusions, like one that affected balance that Shisui-senpai mentioned in our first lesson.

It took me only two tries to successfully cast the genjutsu, but according to Itachi-senpai the most important part of using the jutsu was timing it correctly.

"If your opponent is suddenly unbalanced for no perceivable reason, they are likely to realize that they are in a genjutsu." He said. "You want to time the genjutsu to take effect after a blow to the head, ideally."

And so the rest of the lesson was spent casting the jutsu while sparing with senpai in an effort to time the jutsu, which fortunately only required a single hand sign, with landing a hit. Senpai, being a jounin, was of course going easy on me, and permitted any hit I landed on him to count, not just ones to the head.

Once he had decided I had "progressed adequately," the two of us sat down in the training field.

"Sekai-kun, as you know, both Shisui and I are teaching you, and after discussing things with him, we decided that it would be best if we each focused on different areas in our lessons with you."

"May I ask why?"

"It's easier for us if we don't need to keep track of how much of a lesson the other has taught you." Itachi-senpai explained. "This way the two of us can simply pick up where we left off with you the last time we saw you."

I nodded. "Understood. What will each of you be focusing on?"

"For now I will be focusing on teaching you preset genjutsu and working with you to use them effectively. Shisui will begin teaching you to detect and dispel illusions."

"Alri—" I begun, but was cut short by a shriek of "Aniki!"

I blinked in surprise, and senpai let out the smallest of sighs as a child invaded our training ground.

"Sasuke." Senpai said sternly. He was on his feet before I even noticed he'd moved. "Now is not the time. I'm in the middle of something."

The boy pouted. "Yeah, in the middle of training some little kid! You say you don't have time to train me, but here I find you training someone else! It's not fair! You say you're busy with your duties as a ninja, but—"

"Sekai-kun is a genin I have been assigned to mentor in genjutsu." Itachi-senpai interrupted smoothly. "Training her is one of my duties. The sooner I finish my lesson with her the sooner I can return home, little brother."

The boy crossed his arms and stomped off in a huff. "Fine!" he shouted as he left.

"My apologies." Itachi-senpai said as soon as his brother was out of range.

"It's fine, I'm used to it," I dismissed. "He reminds me of The Nuisance, though not as hyper."

Senpai raised a single brow. "The Nuisance?" he repeated.

Oops. "...Sensei's son." I mumbled. "Can you please not tell her I that's what I think of him by?"

To my surprise, the jounin chuckled in response. "I can see why you do. I've met the boy myself, he's in Sasuke's class."

"...Are you going to tell sensei?" I asked, since he didn't answer my question.

"I suppose I won't." he inclined his head. "So long as you answer a question of mine."

"Okay." I agreed.

"Do you often do that?" I tilted my head in confusion, and Itachi-senpai clarified, "Think of people by names like that?"

"Yes." I admitted, and saw his lip twitch in amusement.

"Do you have one for me?" he asked.

"No, of course not. I actually like you."

"Heh." He shook his head. "Very well, your secret is safe with me."

-x-

It was mid October when team four received our first solo C-rank. Kushina-sensei was still away, Tsunade-sensei was busy at the hospital, and Kairi-sensei was needed for higher ranked missions, so the village decided the three of us could handle a simple mission ourselves. (After all, they have to make their best use of us, right?)

The mission was one we'd done before—running supplies to an outpost, the one we went to on our first C-rank, actually.

Like the previous times we made the run, we sealed the supplies into my arm. But then we hesitated.

"How should we do this?" Aiko asked after an awkward silence.

"Uh..."

"Aiko, you're still the slowest, so you will lead. Sakura and I will match you." I announced, deciding to take charge. "We should move as quickly as you can handle—we want to minimize the time we're on our own."

"But what if that tires us out too much and we're attacked?" Sakura argued.

"Anyone who makes it that far into Fire Country isn't someone we can handle on our own. We're better off running and getting help if we encounter anyone." I countered.

"Good point." Aiko agreed, and our pink haired conceded the point.

Our plan in place, the three of us set off, leaping through the trees. The entire trip to the outpost was fraught with tension. All three of us were anxious to be truly on our own outside of the village. Usually, we would make conversation as we travelled, but without needing to verbalize it, we agreed to move as stealthily as we could without compromising speed.

Fortunately, we arrived at the outpost without issue. We turned the scrolls into the quartermaster and headed towards the mess hall for a quick meal and rest.

"Eh? Is that you, Sekai-chan?" A male voice exclaimed. "What are you doing here?"

Turning towards the sound of the voice, I saw Shisui-senpai sitting at a table with a few others. "Senpai." I greeted, and he motioned for me and my teammates to join him. I glanced at Aiko and Sakura, who looked a bit uncertain, but shrugged in acquiescence.

"We made a delivery run." I told Shisui-senpai as we sat down, my fingers immediately moving to tap along the edge of the table. "We're just taking a break to eat before we head back."

"Oh, right," Senpai grinned. "Guys, this is Sekai-chan, the genin Itachi and I have been tutoring in genjutsu! And these two are her teammates... uh..."

"Haruno Sakura. Pleased to make your acquaintance." Sakura greeted politely.

"Yamanaka Aiko. A pleasure." Aiko said, adjusting her glasses.

"Right, and these are my teammates, Hyuuga Kugi and Hayashi Takeru." He continued, gesturing to them as he said their names.

"Yo," Hayashi said. "You sure you're old enough to be a ninja?"

My lips thinned in annoyance, but I didn't bother responding, especially when senpai smacked him on the back of the head.

"Nice to meet you." said the Hyuuga guy, who had the _creepiest eyes I'd ever fucking seen_. I'd heard of the clan and their eyes, but I'd never met one before, and man did I wish it stayed that way. I knew they had white eyes, but _man_ , if you didn't look closely it looked like it was all sclera. "Ignore Takeru, he's an idiot."

"Where's Kushina-nee-chan?" Shisui asked once introductions were out of the way.

I shrugged. "Not here."

"Then your team leader?" he pressed.

"Sekai's team leader." Aiko said.

Shisui frowned. "You mean it's just the three of you?" I nodded, and his frown deepened. "You shouldn't head back on your own."

"Why not?" I asked, and stopped my tapping.

"Earlier the three of us encountered foreign ninja about a hundred kilometres from here." Creepy-Eyes said. "We took care of them, but..."

"Yeah, from what Shisui-taicho has said, the three of you are pretty fresh genin, I don't think any of us feel comfortable leaving you three to travel back alone."

Sakura frowned. "But what should we do then?"

Senpai hummed in thought. "Well, we're scheduled to head back the day after tomorrow. You can stay here for a couple nights—that shouldn't be a problem. I can send a message to the village that you'll be returning with us due to increased threat level."

"Very well." I agreed, and my team nodded. Shisui-senpai was a jounin, if someone's not pleased with this, then we can just say we were following the orders of a superior.

"Can we eat now?" Sakura asked me.

"Yeah, food, Sekai." Aiko added.

Right. I had almost forgot. I pushed up my sleeve and unsealed three of the bento we had stored up.

-x-

Shisui-senpai assured the three of us that he'd take care of arrangements for us, so after we ate the three of us decided to just chill in the mess hall until he came back for us.

Gleefully, I pulled out my math notes and exercises and got to work. It wasn't often I had such a perfect opportunity.

"What are you doing?" Someone interrupted me a couple hours later. Looking from the corner of my eye, I noticed it was one of Shisui-senpai's teammates. It wasn't Creepy-Eyes, and I couldn't for the life of me remember his name.

"Math."

"Okay. But what exactly?"

"I'm proving this theorem." I replied, pointing to my notes. I'd copied the theorem from a library book that had 'left the proof as an exercise for the student.'

"What does that even mean?" He asked incredulously.

I let out a small sigh. "I'm not your tutor. Go look it up."

"Whatever. What are you doing it for?" he pressed.

"Fun."

"I mean, how do you use it?"

"I don't." I snapped. "Go away."

Senpai's teammate let out a low whistle. "Wo-ow. Someone's grumpy."

I took a deep breath to calm myself, and went back to my proof, ignoring him.

An indeterminate (due to being so immersed in my studies I tuned all else out) amount of time later, Shisui-senpai returned for us.

"What are you doing, Sekai-chan?" he asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Math." My teammates answered for me with amused smirks.

Senpai bent over my shoulder, taking a better look at what I was working on. "Where, exactly, did you learn how to do this, Sekai-chan."

"...Books. I saw them when looking for information on the topic you assigned me in our first lesson." I partially lied.

He snorted. "Right well, pack up. I'm showing you three to where you'll be staying."

I quickly packed up my papers, and followed senpai out of the mess hall. He led us through the maze of identical cabins, until we reached one that he knocked on.

A woman with hair just a shade lighter than my own opened the door. "What is it?"

Shisui-senpai gestured to my team. "Due to increased threat level in the area, these three are going to be staying here for the next two nights, until my team can escort them back to the village. Please help them get settled in."

The woman sighed, but nodded. "Fine. Come on in, you three."

After briefly bidding Shisui-senpai farewell, we followed the woman into cabin.

The inside of the cabin was lined with bunk beds, and not much else. Though there was room for at least thirty people, only four of the bunks seemed to be in use. There were two other women inside, and they looked over curiously at the sound of our entrance.

"Grab a free bunk, girls." The purple haired woman said. "My names Uzuki Yuugao. Welcome the female barracks."

"I'm Yamanaka Aiko, and these are my teammates, Haruno Sakura and Hoshino Sekai." Aiko said.

"What brings you shrimps here?" One of the other women, who had dark green hair, asked. "You lot must be genin."

"So what if we are?" Aiko demanded, crossing her arms.

"So nothing, really." The green haired woman said. "It's just unusual to see an all girl genin team."

The third woman, who was an Uchiha, judging by the symbol on her shoulder, snorted. "Please, I've never seen a purely female genin team. It's more than just unusual."

Sakura and I exchanged glaces, and I lifted my shoulder in a shrug.

"So what are three baby genin doing out here, anyways?" asked the Uchiha.

"Delivery mission." Aiko answered for us. "But we were told that the area is at a higher risk level than it's safe for us to run by ourselves, so we're waiting for a team that's heading our direction to escort us."

Uzuki frowned. "Why isn't your sensei enough of an escort?"

"It's just the three of us." My blonde teammate said nonchalantly.

The older women stared at us. "I see..." The green haired one murmured.

-x-

Myself, my team, and the three others from the barracks were the only girls in the entire encampment. Sakura must have been wondering too, since she asked Uzuki-san.

It turned out that this base was filled with combat focused ninja, and despite everything, there aren't a lot of women who were combat specialists. Most women fell into other specialties, like sensors, intel related fields, medics... and assassins.

It was interesting to learn, and the older ninja were more than happy to give us advice and explain things.

I was almost disappointed when the day senpai and his team could escort us back to the village came. It was nice having so much free time to do whatever I wanted.

We left mid afternoon. For the trip back, Shisui-senpai's team insisted on carrying us on their backs, since us genin were "basically snails." A trip that took us over three hours took senpai's team only an hour and a half, even carrying our additional weight.

Once we reached the village, our teams separated. I dismissed Aiko and Sakura since I had taken the role of team leader, and headed to the office that assigned us the mission. I filled out the mission report and the form explaining the extended duration in one of the office's empty cubicles.

With all the monotonous work done, I headed towards the training ground my team had unofficially claimed, and found my teammates were already there, waiting for me.

"Finally!" Sakura sighed upon noticing me. "Aiko has something to say, but refused to tell me until you got here!"

I looked at my blonde teammate and cocked my head to the side, silently asking her to explain.

"I turn twelve at the end of the week," she said. "And my parents gave me permission to invite you both to my birthday celebration, on Saturday."

"Of course we'll come! Right, Sekai?" Sakura exclaimed, clapping her hands together in excitement. I nodded in agreement. "How should we dress?"

"Formal." Aiko winced as she said it. "My parents insist. It's mostly just family, my parents, uncles, aunts and a few cousins, a clan thing. But I asked if you could come, since a team is pretty much family..."

"... I don't have formal wear." I mumbled, looking at the ground.

"Oh..." Aiko drooped. "Sorry, I should have realized."

I shrugged a shoulder in response. It's not like it was her fault.

"Um, I think my mom kept a few of my things from when I was younger," Sakura interjected. "There's probably something appropriate for you to borrow."

Aiko brightened. "Really? Thank you so much! I really want the two of you there!"

"Thank you, Sakura. I appreciate it." I said with a small smile. Sakura beamed in response.

-x-

The morning of Aiko's birthday, I went over to Sakura's house to get ready. Her mother had brought a few of Sakura's old kimono out of storage, and with her help I picked out the one that would fit me best.

It was a gorgeous pale pink one with red and white flowers, and it paired with a fairly plain geometric patterned red obi. Considering it was fall, it was terribly out of season, but it wasn't like I had many options.

Sakura's mother helped the two of us get ready, myself more than Sakura, as I had no idea how to properly wear a kimono, or how to do much of anything with my hair.

"You look so pretty, Sekai!" Sakura squealed once her mother finished with me. "That's such a lovely hair style on you."

"You look very nice, too." I replied. And she did. She wore a gorgeous brown kimono with red and yellow falling leaves and a red, flower patterned obi. Her hair was worn in an elegant updo, and she wore just the slightest amount of make up.

We bid farewell to Sakura's mother, who I thanked profusely, and set off for the Yamanaka compound. We walked slowly, which was apparently proper etiquette when wearing kimono, so the trip took longer than I expected.

When we arrived at the compound, Aiko was waiting for us near the gates, in a lovely orange kimono intricately decorated with embroidered flowers, and a beige obi. She greeted us by complimenting our outfits, and then led the way to her home.

As soon as we stepped through the door, a blonde woman was upon us. "Oh! The two of you must be Aiko's teammates! Hoshino-chan and Haruno-chan, right? The two of you look absolutely lovely! Such cute girls!" she crooned as she pinched my cheek. It took all myself control not recoil from her. "My Aiko is so lucky to be on a team with such sweethearts! Almost as lucky as you are to be on a team with my pride and joy!"

"A pleasure, ma'am." I said once she backed away a bit, and bowed.

"A pleasure." Sakura echoed.

"Well, come in, come in, the two of you are a bit early, so why don't the three of you have a seat in the front room while I finish up lunch?"

"Sure, mom." Aiko said hurriedly, grabbing each of us by the wrist. "We'll do that."

Aiko hastily pulled us through the halls, her face crimson.

"Sorry about that." She winced once we were seated. "Mom's just kind of..."

"Proud of you?" Sakura offers.

Aiko nods. "That's one way to put it..."

-x-

Lunch was an awkward affair. To my surprise, the clan head was present, with his family, as he was apparently Aiko's paternal uncle. Along with them, there were three aunts and two uncles on her mother's side, and four cousins, all who were quite a bit older than Aiko, save for the clan heiress, who was a year younger.

I felt completely out of place, and only spoke when spoken to.

On top of that, Aiko's parents seemed to be able to take anything someone said and turn it into how amazing their darling Aiko was. If I were more expressive, I would have been wearing a permanent cringe throughout the meal.

Like when the head, Ino-something-or-another, was talking about how his daughter was doing in the academy, Aiko's father started saying things like "Oh! I remember when my little Aiko was still in the academy! She managed to transform perfectly on her first try! She's so talented..."

Unlike me, the heiress wasn't subtle in her reactions, constantly rolling her eyes or snorting in disbelief. It seemed to be some unspoken agreement that no one did anything about it though.

Finally, the meal ended, and my team and Aiko's younger cousin were chased outside while "the adults talked about boring things," like we were two year olds.

Once the four of us were alone in the background, my team started talking amongst ourselves, effectively ignoring the heiress. Well, Sakura and Aiko spoke, I mostly listened to them. We didn't discuss anything important, seeing as we were in the presence of a civilian, but said civilian seemed to grow angry the more we ignored her.

"Hey!" She snapped. "Stop ignoring me."

Sakura glanced over at her, but Aiko subtly shook her head, telling Sakura not to bother, and kept our conversation flowing.

From the corner of my eye, I noticed the heiress puff out her cheeks in frustration.

"Whatever," She scoffed. "You're so stuck up, anyways. Always thinking your so much better than me. Meanwhile, you're friends with two nobodies, one of which is a baby who can't even pick out a kimono that matches her hair, let alone the season."

Aiko's eye twitched slightly, but still didn't grace the heiress with her attention. Sakura on the other hand, was clenching her fists, and I could practically see the vein bulging at her temple. She was shooting sharp glares over at the

"I don't know why daddy made me come to your birthday party, you four-eyed freak. I bet it's because he feels sorry for you, what with having no friends but a baby and a girl with a billboard br—"

"Just shut the fuck up, piglet!" Sakura finally snapped, jumping to her feet and whirling around to face the heiress. I wasn't quite sure why she called the girl Piglet, but I decided that would be what I would call her too.

"Do you realize who I am?" Piglet screeched. "I'm the heiress of the Yamanaka clan!"

"Yeah, yeah." Sakura dismissed her words with a wave of her hand. "What's your problem? Obviously you don't like Aiko, but that doesn't mean you should blatantly antagonize her!"

"Don't tell me how to treat my cousin!" Piglet's face was flushed. "You don't know anything about this! She's so full of herself and thinks she's better than me, and that she deserves—"

"Shannaro!" Sakura shouted, and stomped her foot, making a rather large dent in the ground and causing it to shake lightly. "I don't care! Leave us alone! I won't let you talk about my friends like that!"

Piglet's eyes widened, and I was betting that it was as much fear as shock. She took a step back, and just stared at Sakura for a moment. She composed herself, and said with a sniff, "Whatever. I'm going home."

"Oh my god, Aiko! I'm so sorry!" Sakura wailed as soon as Piglet was gone. "I can't believe I did that, and I'm so sorry about the yard!"

"Nice." I complimented her with an approving nod. I really hadn't expected that from her.

"It's fine. I'll just tell my parents Ino was bothering me again, and you stood up for me, and they'll _thank you_." Aiko assured our pink haired teammate, and pulled her into a hug. "Thank you for standing up for us. It means a lot."

I nodded in agreement.

"Get over here Sekai," Aiko ordered, and pulled me up by the arm to join in the group hug.

-x-

Notes: Sekai is meant to be a _very_ quiet character, but I have a habit of favouring dialogue when writing, which makes it hard to keep her quiet. So writing this is a bit of an exercise for me. However, I'm aware I'm not doing the best at it, but just keep in mind I'm writing scenes where she _needs_ to talk.

The ramen scene is mostly a "take that!" to all the writers who have characters scold Naruto for "being rude" by slurping his ramen. Like, no. In Japan that is perfectly acceptable. They say it makes ramen taste better.

Differences in characterization of characters from canon is largely a result of different upbringings. Naruto has parents, and isn't treated poorly by the villagers, hence he is different. Also keep in mind he _was_ very bratty at the beginning of the series. Similarly, Sasuke's clan is alive and thriving, so he's not an angsty "avenger." Instead, he's a happy child who's overly attached to his older brother, whom he is extremely possessive of. I mention this stuff because it was brought up in a review.

The conversation with Itachi just kind of happened. I didn't really plan it.

I spent like two hours researching kimono, and what colours/patterns are appropriate for each season and how formal, etc.

Why is Ino so mean, when she was the one who canonically stood up to bullies for Sakura? She has nothing against Sakura and Sekai, she's just trying to get to Aiko. If it weren't for Aiko, and she saw someone else bullying Sakura and Sekai, then she would have stepped in. You'll find out why she's like this later on!

School has started, so updates will be a bit slow. Sorry! Thank you all for the follows, favs, and reviews. Your support means a lot to me. Please forgive any mistakes.

Don't forget to check out the AtW tumblr, .com

All the best,

The Mathemagician


	13. Eleven

Against the World

"I judge others for their failings, yet I make excuses for mine."

-x-

"Your orders regarding Experiment 4869, Hokage-sama?"

"Continue. Orochimaru may be gone, but we're not letting everything go to waste." Dan answered after a pause. "His research is still valuable—if he perfects this, it would be revolutionary. Summon Tsunade—she can oversee it from here."

"Yes, sir."

"Dismissed."

-x-

Eleven

Kushina-sensei returned shortly after the beginning of November.

She was visibly exhausted, so I did my best to be as undemanding as possible. Unfortunately, her son wasn't as considerate, and I could see the strain it was putting on her. Sensei had been gone for over a month, and during that time she had missed The Nuisance's birthday, and he wasn't letting her forget it.

He didn't seem to understand that she'd had no say in the matter, and that her duty to the village took precedence over him. If this had been The Before, I would have agreed with him. But things were different here. In The Before parents were supposed to put their children above all else, or at least, that was what I was raised to believe. But here things were different, and The Nuisance wasn't raised in a society that believed that, so I couldn't help but feel he needed to get the fuck over himself.

He was even more furious that she spent most of her time since coming back with me. Again, The Nuisance didn't seem to understand that she was spending time with me because it was her duty to teach me. No, the little brat seemed to think she was choosing me over him.

It got to the point where I refused to go over for dinner, because I didn't want to deal with him. Not that I told Kushina-sensei that, of course. I just told her I thought that her son needed her right now, for some one-on-one time.

I was quite proud of myself for that one. Instead of making her furious by pointing out how much I hate the boy, I made her think I was "so thoughtful and sweet!"

-x-

"Today we'll be starting on linked seals." Sensei announced one morning. "What do you know about them?"

"Linked seals are two or more seals that are designed to be used in conjugation with each other, and seals that are connected to the same pocket dimension." I answered.

"Excellent." Kushina-sensei nodded in approval. "We're working in my office today. Come on."

We took a leisurely stroll from the training ground to the Hokage tower, in no particular hurry. Sensei even stopped and bought us some sweets to snack on. Once we reached the tower, she led me through the maze of corridors and staircases to her office. I had yet to memorize the route myself, as it wasn't often she brought me there. Usually, she taught me sealing in her home, but with the way The Nuisance was acting, I wasn't surprised she decided against it.

Entering the room, I saw that the wall that had previously been covered with papers and half finished seals was bare but for a large blackboard. One of the arm chairs had been moved to face the black board, and she had added a wheeled lap desk in front of it.

"Take a seat, Sekai-chan." Sensei gestured to the arm chair. "And take out your notebook. Today is a lecture day."

I slid into the seat, but had to sit on my knees to comfortably use the lap desk. I unsealed my notebook, a pencil, and my fountain pen and ink, and carefully arranged them in front of me.

"To start with," Kushina-sensei began, pointing at me with a piece of chalk from where she stood at the blackboard. "I want to clarify that linked seals are specifically an Uzumaki technique. Some seal users from other clans and villages can make linked storage seals, but nobody outside of the Uzumaki has unlocked the full potential of them."

I nodded seriously, understanding that she was finally teaching me some of her clan's closely held secrets.

From there, she spent hours lecturing and drawing diagrams on the blackboard while I took meticulous notes. Sensei was a good lecturer. While discussing the concepts and theories, she brought up interesting and humorous anecdotes that made it easier to remember things.

For example, linked storage seals were actually a completely accidental discovery. Ages ago, a young Uzumaki apprentice was drawing her first storage seal. What happened, was that her ink completely bled through the paper she was using, into the one beneath it. When creating a seal, you must channel your chakra into the ink. So since the ink bled through, she ended up channelling her chakra into both the seal on top and the bottom one at the same time. At first the apprentice just though she had accidentally made two storage seals at once. But when her sensei was testing them, he discovered that they accessed the same pocket dimension. From there, the Uzumaki clan pushed a lot of man power into researching the hows and whys of what happened, and later finding a new way to apply it.

Linking the two seals was found to have happened because of channelling the same chakra into the ink of the two seals at the same rate and time, as they were created. The two seals had to be created simultaneously.

At first it seemed useless outside of linked storage seals—the only way to do it seemed to be the way the Uzumaki apprentice had. But then an Uzumaki seal master who was well versed in ninjutsu found a way around it.

The main component to every non-storage linked seal was a specific sigil placed at the top. This sigil had to be drawn with your own blood. For the rest of the seal, you didn't channel your chakra into it as you made it, leaving it what was typically considered a "dead" seal. Then, you used the first of two Uzumaki secret ninjutsu for linked seals.

From there, you went to create any other seals you wished to link with the first one in the same matter. Then, you cast the second ninjutsu, which released the chakra from your blood and let it flow into each seal at a uniform rate, changing the seals from "dead" to "alive."

There were limits, of course. Any dead seals you've created with the sigil will become live and considered part of a single linked seal. Meaning you can only create one linked seal at a time. Those who've attempted to make two different linked seals without activating one first often faced disastrous consequences due to the unstable nature of the seal. Of course, once one is live, you can of course create more.

Another issue is that if one part of the seal was destroyed without your knowledge before it became live, then activating the remaining components could have similar results as accidentally linking components of two unrelated seals.

There were far more drawbacks and dangers, but those were the two most pressing.

By the time Kushina-sensei had finished her lecture, I felt the same as I had when I'd learned the true potential of genjutsu.

-x-

After her lesson, Kushina-sensei dismissed me for the day with the explicit instruction to come to dinner that evening.

I spent the rest of the day reviewing my notes as I ran laps around the training grounds, and when evening was upon me, I headed towards the Senju district.

"Sekai-chan!" Minato-san called as I took my shoes off in the entryway of the Uzumaki home and slipped on the purple bunny slippers they kept for me. "Dinner's almost ready! Come join me at the table, I have someone to introduce you to!"

"Hello." I said as I entered the dining room. Minato-san, Kakashi-senpai, The Nuisance, and an older man were all sitting at the table. I blinked at the stranger, feeling rather annoyed. He was in my seat. I stared him in the eye as I took the available seat across from him. I could already tell I wasn't going to like him.

Before anyone could speak, Kushina-sensei shuffled into the room, carrying several serving bowls full of her delicious food with her chakra chains. One by one, she took them from her chains and placed them on the table. "Alright guys! Dig in."

"Thank you for the meal!" All of us said in unison.

The meal sensei prepared was phenomenal as usual. Minato-san briefly introduced me to the man beside him—he was Jiraiya of the Legendary Three, and Minato-san's own genin sensei.

I opted not to speak much, letting the Uzumaki family catch up with Jiraiya. The Nuisance in particular seemed to be excited to see the man. He chatted away happily, flitting from one topic to another under the fond gaze of the legendary ninja.

When the meal was finished Kushina-sensei made a shadow clone to clean up while we all moved to the living room to relax. The Uzumaki trio chose to sit on the couch, Jiraiya claimed the arm chair and Kakashi balanced on the windowsill while I opted to sit on the foot stool.

"I was thinking," Minato-san started. "Since Sekai doesn't really know Kakashi very well, and has only just met you, sensei, why don't we all go around and introduce ourselves. You know, likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams, that sort of thing. A get to know you game of sorts."

It seemed the blond man was up to his old tricks, trying to get me to participate more in the conversation.

"Yeah! Yeah!" The Nuisance bounced in his seat. "Can I go first? Can I?"

"Sure." I agreed. "Go for it."

"Alright!" the younger blond cheered. "Uzumaki Naruto! I like ramen, training with mom and dad, and the colour orange. I dislike sealing, studying, and people who look at me and only see other people. My hobbies are pranks and spending time with my friends. My dream is to be the best Hokage ever! You next, mom!"

"Uzumaki Kushina, also known as The Red Death and The Chains of the Shinigami." I suppressed a snort. Sensei sure liked to brag about her bingo book monikers. "I like ramen and chatting with my friends, and most of all, my family. I dislike foxes and stuck up people, like Fugu-face. My hobbies are cooking, painting and pulling pranks. My dream..." Kushina faltered slightly. "Well, it was to be strong enough to protect my home, which I like to think I've accomplished, for the most part."

"Uzumaki Minato, though most people still refer to me as Namikaze. I like Kushina's cooking, spending time with my family and learning new things. I dislike pointless fighting. My main hobby is reading. My dream... Let's just say I've always shared Kushina's." Minato smiled sadly, and I got the distinct feeling I was missing something. Before I could start to wonder what exactly I was missing, it was my turn.

"Hoshino Sekai. I like the colours purple and aquamarine, and math. I dislike stupid people and being bored." _And this village_ , I added to myself. "My hobbies are studying, especially seals, and reading. I don't have a dream."

"Are you serious, kid? You like _math_ and _studying_?" Jiraiya asked. I crossed my arms and nodded. "Well, aren't you a barrel of fun. You remind me of—eh, never mind. I guess it's my turn, then.

"I am Jiraiya of the Legendary Three! The Great Toad Sage of Mount Myoboku!" The man boasted. "I like receiving attention of the female persuasion and dislike kiwi. My hobbies include writing and peeping at the bathhouse! My dre—"

"...You peep at the bathhouses?" I interrupted. "You're a pervert—"

"Ah, ah! I'm a _super_ pervert." Jiraiya cut in.

"You're a dangerous sexual predator is what you are!" I spat with disgust.

"Hey, that's going a bit far, don't you think?" Minato tried to deescalate, though I could tell he was surprised by the vehemence of my reaction. "He's harmless, really."

"Violating vulnerable women who believe they are safe from creeps like him is _not_ harmless." I seethed. "I can't believe you, Minato-san, defending him."

"Sekai-chan, Minato's right." Kushina placated. "Like, it's really not a big deal. I mean, like, I don't like it either when some perv is spying on me, but they get what they deserve when they do!"

The old pervert chuckled, then winced. "You certainly make sure of _that_. You've certainly sent me to the hospital more than once..."

Words couldn't describe how furious I felt. _Children_ bathed in the local bathhouses. _I_ sometimes did! And Minato-san and sensei, who I thought were decent people, were basically okay with this? They thought beating him up, which hardly stopped him, was an adequate punishment? I just... I don't remember a lot about people I knew in The Before, but Iremember a friend, or maybe a classmate, being stalked and harassed by a man who'd spy on her, send her creepy messages, and that sort of thing. And I remember how badly it hurt her.

It hurt my _mother_. This sort of attitude is how I came to be born in this world. A ninja took advantage of her. And Jiraiya is taking advantage of who even knows how _many_ women. Who's to say he doesn't go any further than just peeping?

It wasn't harmless. It was a big deal. But these people, who I thought were the decent sort, didn't see this. And I don't know how to explain it to them.

So I took a deep breath and relaxed my facial muscles. "You're right. It's fine. I'm—I just over reacted. It's a sensitive topic. Please continue Jiraiya-san."

"Uh... Right." he chuckled awkwardly. "Well... My dream is to end the cycle of hatred and bring about true, lasting peace."

Minato and Kushina sent me a look, one that seemed to say _See? He isn't that bad of a person._

"Wow." I resisted the urge to clap sarcastically. How naive can you get?

"What?" he demanded defensively. "What's wrong with my dream?"

"It's impossible." I replied, leaving off the _uh-duh_. "How do you think you could accomplish it?"

"We fight because we can't let go of old grudges. Someone killed your friend, so you kill them. Then their friend kills you, and some other friend of yours kills that person. It's an endless cycle. It's how this war got started." he explained earnestly. "We need people to forgive others. If we forgive each other, if we understand each other, we can have peace."

"You really are naive for an old guy." I commented. "That won't work."

"Why not?" He demanded hotly.

"Because some people don't want to forgive! They don't want to understand people! There will always be people who want to fight. There will always be reasons _to_ fight. It's not always about revenge. Just look at the second war! It started because of economic disparity—because some nations were lacking in basic necessities such as food and water!" I retorted. "Even if you manage to convince everyone now, all it takes for peace to fall apart is one person who is willing to destroy it gaining power and influence. It can't last. For example, say twenty years after peace is established, a new Raikage comes into power and decides 'fuck those Leaf ninja, they're doing something I dislike' and it just escalates from there. Leaf isn't just going to stand by and let Cloud take and do whatever they desire. Leaf will fight to protect it's people."

"You're such a misanthropist." Jiraiya dismissed. "People _can_ be convinced. There might be a few outliers, but most people don't want to fight, to continue losing people. Humans have an amazing capacity for forgiveness and understanding, don't underestimate it. People aren't inherently bad."

"They aren't inherently _good_ either. Not to mention, there is the existence of _psychopaths_. You know, people who completely lack the capacity for empathy and don't care how their actions affect the rest of the world, so long as they benefit." I rolled my eyes. "Also, you haven't addressed my last point—you said it's possible to convince people, which I still disagree with as you had no real argument based on logic and objective fact, but rather your subjective opinion. But you never refuted my argument on why it won't last." I pointed out.

"Che, I didn't see the point. It's obvious isn't it?" he laughed. "Just don't let those people come into power. The Kage pick their successors, and are careful to ensure they possess the qualities they value. A peaceful Kage will pick a peaceful successor."

" _Oh my god, this fucking moron._ " I muttered to myself in English, and Jiraiya, who wasn't used to it, gave me a strange look. I took another deep breath and continued in this world's language, my words practically dripping with sarcasm. "Yeah, and someone who's power hungry won't pretend to be what their Kage is looking for in a successor and not reveal their true motives until it's too late. How silly of me to think that. It's not like ninja _deceive_ people."

"You really think someone can get away with hiding something that big for that long, kid? The Kage aren't morons—"

"If you say so." I scoffed. "Besides, there are times there are legitimate conflicts with other parties that aren't easy to solve, especially if one party believes their actions are acceptable and moral, but the other believes the same action is immoral."

"I think morality is pretty objective—"

"Obviously it's fucking _not_. _You three_ ," I snarled, pointing at sensei, Minato-san and the pervert. "All seem to think it's acceptable to use skills you've learned as a ninja to _prey on innocent women_ , whereas _I_ can see that it's fucked up and harms other people!"

"No it doesn't!" Jiraiya protested, and Kushina and Minato-san nodded in agreement. "They may be embarrassed, but they're fine! I dare you to give one legitimate example of when it hurt someone!"

I gave him a cold look. "It hurt _my mother_." I said through clenched teeth. "I have no clue who my father is—and neither did she. The best guest is that a _ninja_ used their training to _rape her_ , without her evening knowing it!"

The adults all paled. "I—I had no idea..." Kushina-sensei breathed. "Sekai-chan..."

"Whatever, I'm done." I cut in. "Clearly there's no convincing you about either subject, and you can hardly change _my_ mind." Erasing my emotions form my face, I turned to the couch where Minato and Kushina-sensei sat, wide eyed. "Sensei, Minato-san, thank you for dinner. I'd best be returning home for the night."

Without waiting for a reply, I hurriedly gathered my belongings.

"Wow. I think that's the most emotion I've seen from her since mom brought her around, believe it!" I heard the Nuisance exclaim as I slipped on my sandals.

I opened the front door to leave, and just before it closed behind me I heard Minato's dry comment. "Well, that certainly went well."

-x-

I was relieved the next day when Kairi-sensei showed up at my apartment at five in the morning. Usually I wouldn't be, but since she had an out of village mission for my team...

After the previous night's explosive end, I wasn't ready to see Kushina-sensei or her family yet. Or the legendary ninja that I had decided to call Sex Offender.

Sakura and Aiko, of course, were not nearly as happy about the early awakening as I was.

Once the team had all gathered, Kairi-sensei explained the mission. "Today, we'll be heading towards Red Bean country. It will take awhile, and we'll have to be very careful after we cross the border."

Sakura frowned. "Why? They have no ninja, and none of our enemies are close to them. Our _allies_ are the next closest nation."

"It's a... "retrieval" mission, so to speak." Kairi-sensei said with a sharky grin.

Suspicion was roused inside of me. "Define "retrieval" mission."

"We-ell..." She drawled "We just need to pick up an item there." Sakura and Aiko seemed to relax, probably assuming it was another pigeon mission, but I wasn't so sure. "We just have to do it, ah, _discreetly_."

"So we're stealing it." I stated, startling my teammates.

"My, aren't you the clever one, hm? We are, indeed." Kairi-sensei smirked. "Don't worry. Our target is in the possession of some rich civilian. It'll be easy."

"Why are we suddenly taking this sort of mission, sensei?" Aiko asked. "It's really not in our skill set."

"Isn't it, though?" Kairi-sensei pressed, towering over us. "You're all adequately trained in stealth for it, you all know how to pick locks, and it's a civilian, so there shouldn't be any traps to deal with, however if there are I'll take care of it. Besides, three little girls with their older cousin is hardly suspicious in the first place."

-x-

Morality here is confusing. Apparently, ninja had no problem with half the things that the people of The Before had deemed immensely immoral, yet they looked down on thieving. That's not to say they thought it was a terrible thing, they just though that it was distasteful. I didn't understand.

It might have been a bit of a clan thing, that maybe bled out into the general ninja population. They were terrified of having their secrets, sacred artifacts, and such stolen from them. Therefore, _stealing_ was something they grew up thinking of as _wrong_.

It was stupid, and the fact that Sakura and Aiko were so bothered by it annoyed me. I opted to ignore them for the moment, not wanting to snap at them and start a fight.

The village we were headed for in Red Bean was over twenty-five hundred kilometres away from Leaf, and it took us five days to get there, even though we spent most of our waking hours running. I avoided speaking to anyone but Kairi-sensei for the entire trip, frustration with my teammates, Kushina-sensei, Minato-san, and Sex Offender, still clouding my mind.

Awhile after arriving in Red Bean country, the four of us sealed away most of our gear and changed into civilian clothing. Kairi-sensei then instructed us each to use the transformation jutsu to modify our appearance. I was a bit worried since I was pretty terrible at the transformation jutsu, but fortunately it was only little changes that I could handle.

Aiko's hair was darkened to a dirty blonde, while Sakura and I both became brunettes, as did Sensei. While hair colour was the only thing Kairi-sensei and Sakura needed to change, Aiko and I were ordered to make our eyes brown.

Once we were sufficiently disguised, Kairi-sensei led us to the main road, and we travelled the rest of the way to the village where our target was located.

Travelling at a civilian pace was tedious and boring, so when we finally reached our destination, I was glad to get to work.

-x-

Our target was, of all things, a ceramic cat figurine. And if the sketch we were given is accurate, an ugly one, at that. It was, apparently, worth as much as an Uchiha costs on the black market. Naturally, I found that exceedingly difficult to believe. But hey, whatever floats our client's boat.

We spent five days doing reconnaissance. It was Aiko's job to chat up the townspeople to find out more about the owner of the home housing the figurine. Sakura's job was to keep an eye on the residence and who came and went. Meanwhile, I was the one assigned to actually break in and "retrieve" the ugly ceramic cat.

On the third day, Sakura brought news that the homeowner left for the first time since she'd been keeping watch. Aiko had discovered that the man was a wealthy recluse who rarely left his house, except for the trips he took to acquire his "collectibles," and would be gone for weeks at a time. Aside from that, he didn't even go out for groceries—instead he ordered them in.

By the fifth day, we were certain that he had left town, so on the sixth Kairi-sensei helped me inspect the exterior security.

To my delight, I managed to spot everything myself. Not that, that was saying much. The locks, unfortunately, were not something I could simply pick and be done with. The locks on the windows couldn't be opened from the outside without damaging them, and using the front door increased the chances of being noticed. Fortunately, there were still options. It might keep civilians out, but it was nothing a ninja couldn't handle.

That night, it was my turn to act.

I scaled up the house until I reached the roof. From there, I slipped down into the chimney, being careful not to get covered in soot. I landed in the fireplace, and discovered there were bars across it, large enough to easily place wood, but small enough that even a small child would have difficulty slipping through.

I checked myself for soot, but I was clean. It seemed the fireplace hadn't been used recently. Likely because though it was now early December, Red Bean Country was much further south than Hidden Leaf, and the temperature was still pleasantly warm.

I delicately slid through the bars, barely making it through despite my petite stature. I rolled my shoulders to loosen up, and intently observed the room.

The room was filled with shelves along every wall. Some were piled full of books and others contained knickknacks, over flowing jewellery boxes, and more. The rest of the furniture in the room was piled with boxes. It was a hoarder's paradise.

With a sigh, I decided to check out the other rooms before I started the actual search. With the exception of the kitchen, master bedroom, and bath rooms, the rest of the house was just as cluttered as the first room.

I searched room after room, until I came upon a room with piles of books all over, and tapestries hanging on the walls.

On instinct, I carefully lifted each one of the tapestries, and discovered a patch of wall that was unusual from the rest. The texture was rougher, like something scraped against it. I knocked on the wall, and my lips twitched up. It was hollow. I slid my hands over the wall, exploring, until I put pressure on the correct place and the wall pushed inwards. I pulled on the edge of the wall, and it slid to the side.

Carefully, I stepped into the newly revealed room. Unlike the others, while it contained an assortment of items, everything was neatly organized. With a careful eye, I perused the shelves and surfaces of the room, looking for that ugly cat. After all, if it was worth _that much_ money, it was likely kept somewhere safe instead of just lying around.

My instincts were correct, and I found the figurine in a drawer of an old bureau. I carefully sealed it into my arm, and exited the hidden room, but paused after ducking out of the tapestries, and inhaled sharply.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a book. Not just any book though, but one with _English_ _writing_ on the cover.

After a moment of hesitation, I decided to examine it. It was old—practically falling apart. The pages curled at the edges and the text was faded, but I was able to make out that it was a journal of some sort. I chewed on the inside of my cheek, staring at it. I sealed it into my thigh.

 _Well,_ I reassured myself, _I'm already stealing, anyway. Why not take something for myself? And why stop at just this? There might be others English books here..._

In the end, I didn't find anymore books in English, but I did pilfer a few math texts that looked interesting.

"What took so long?" Kairi-sensei asked when I met everyone back at the hotel we'd been staying in.

"Hoarder." I replied, and she nodded in understanding. She'd probably seen a lot of them if she regularly did missions like this. "In addition, it was in a hidden room."

"Detailed report later," she ordered. "For now, get some rest. We leave in the morning."

-x-

 **Notes:** Bad, bad girl, Sekai-chan! Stealing for your own personal gain? Shame on you.

I intended to include some other things in this chapter, but it was getting away from me. So next time!

I don't hate Jiraiya! I promise! I actually like him, but his peeping is really creepy and not funny. I decided to try to frame it as values dissonance—to this world it's really not a big deal, that's just the way things are, it's normal. That in no way makes his behaviour in any way actually acceptable. The Naruto world is just... they have no ethics, no concept of human rights. Sekai's opinions on world peace are essentially my own. It's a naive, fool's dream. It's not possible to have both peace and free will.

Also, people keep saying things in fics like "He's one of the three sannin!" and it's like. Dude, you're literally saying he's one of the three, three ninja, you know that, right? It would make better sense to say "He's one of the legendary three!" or simply "He's legendary!" Legendary is the important portion of the title bestowed upon them, not "sannin."

Now, in a review, someone said Sekai must have been a bitch in her past life, because she's such a little shit now. But... No...? Not necessarily? She barely remembers any details from her first life. She has pieces of her old personality, but a lot of it developed in her current life.

There's a poll on my profile. I'm curious about who anyone might ship Sekai with, or like to see her with.

Remember the tumblr, sekai-against-the-world, has progress updates, trivia, etc.

Thank you all so much for the follows and favourites, but especially the reviews. It all means so much to me.

Sorry for mistakes/typos,

TheMathemagician


	14. Twelve

Against the World

"You don't need to use genjutsu to create illusions."

-x-

It took me a long time to realize how lucky I am. Most no-name orphans end up as canon fodder. They used to think it was impossible for one to be a genius, a prodigy. But Namikaze Minato changed that.

So they started looking closer, paying attention. Most still end up dead on the battlefield. Most aren't going to amount to anything special if they do survive.

Being picked out as special early on guaranteed that any teachers I had actually _cared_ and trained me seriously.

I was lucky.

But then again, I wasn't quite a no-name orphan, exactly.

-x-

Twelve

By the time we returned to the village, Kushina-sensei had already been sent back out. Part of me was relieved that I didn't have to face her yet, but a larger part of me was worried that, that night would be the last I saw of her.

It wasn't a pleasant feeling, and I knew that _**when**_ she came back, I'd have to speak with her to clear the air. (It was definitely _**when**_ she came back. Not _if_.)

Unlike the last time Sensei was out fighting, I found myself recruited by the village to take on some of the seal work in her place. As the apprentice of the village's Seal Master, I was technically considered the interim Seal Master, despite the fact that Minato-san was quite obviously more skilled than me. As such, much of her work fell to me. I wasn't naive enough to believe I was taking on everything though. It was not hard to deduce that everything I was working on was at or below my skill level, and nothing was classified.

I learned quite a bit through it all, actually. Nothing about sealing, but plenty about how things worked behind the scenes.

One of my jobs was to check that the stamps used to mass produce seals lacked any flaws. The task seemed beneath me, but evidently most lacked the ability to determine if there are any errors in a basic exploding tag or storage seal. A handful had to be tossed out due to manufacturing flaws, but most were of decent quality and would work just fine, even if the designs were unnecessarily complicated and convoluted.

More commonly, I was essentially told "make us a seal that does this specific thing." I was vexed to discover that the limit of the ineptitude of these people was obviously approaching infinity. Do these pathetic excuses of sentient life even understand that sealing isn't magic? That there are _limits_ to what it can accomplish? That sealing _**doesn't fucking work that way, you**_ _ **mentally deficient centipedes?**_

Someone wanted us to make a _mind control_ seal! Seriously, who even let that get this far? It was completely impossible. How dare people waste my time on this sort of nonsense? I'll never get those hours back!

For every towering stack of proposals, only maybe two or three were actually worth doing. The rest I was to sort into piles. One pile for proposals that are outside the limits of seals, another for seals that were mundane, a third for ones suggesting ones that already exist, and finally a pile of the more dubious requests.

I put things like "a seal to clean my teeth" in the mundane pile, and I won't even get into the kind of seals that made it into the dubious pile. Suffice to say they were possible, but they sounded dangerous enough that I wouldn't go making them without direct approval from the Hokage. I don't think some people realized how badly somethings could be abused. Not that I didn't find myself making note of some of them in the back of my mind.

Sorting everything was a pain. Fortunately, I had access to the stamps Kushina-sensei used for her paper work, so I could complete things more efficiently.

I took great pleasure in stamping "REJECTED" onto the ludicrous proposals, either accompanied by "STUPID" or "IMPOSSIBLE."

But by far my favourite part was creating the seals along the guidelines of the actually useful proposals. Some of them were straightforward, but others I had to think about for a couple days and do some research. I loved the challenge.

-x-

I could count the number of times I'd seen my team in the month since Sensei left on one hand, and still have fingers to spare. It was unfortunate, but our schedules did not align.

All the paperwork I was doing kept me from doing any missions, though each week I was paid as if I completed a B-rank. It was time consuming, and by the time I was finished, I barely had time to keep up with my physical conditioning. I could practically feel my skew sliding back towards the spiritual end of the spectrum. All that progress and hard work, lost.

My teammates were busy too. Though they had plenty of time for team and individual instruction, they were occupied with their own tasks. I wasn't sure what Aiko was up to, but I'd frequently heard about how busy Sakura was at the hospital. And from what I'd seen, it wasn't hard to see that the hospital was busy, either.

There were certain rooftop areas that were to be kept clear of traffic. These areas were the paths from the gates to the hospital. The purpose of them was so that severely injured ninja can get to the hospital without others getting in the way.

The paths had a lot of activity, lately. From what I heard, things were getting pretty bad out there, and field medics were just patching their patients up so they'd last long enough to get back here and get real medical attention.

I tried to ignore it—it wasn't my business. But then one day I recognized someone.

Kakashi-senpai.

I stopped where I was, and fixed my gaze on the silver haired ninja. He was being carried over the rooftops by three ninja. Two were supporting him, and one appeared to be a medic, who was continuing treatment as they moved.

That wasn't a good sign.

I licked my lips, my eyes following him until they couldn't any more.

I didn't know him that well. I'd only met him a couple times, and the last time hadn't exactly gone well. But... from what I did know, I liked him. He didn't treat me like I was a kid.

With a sigh, I continued on to the Hokage tower. Even if I followed him to the hospital right now, no one would tell me anything. It was pointless, and I had work to do.

For now.

-x-

Two days later I went to visit Kakashi-senpai in the hospital. Initially, the receptionists were hesitant to tell me which room he was in. I suppose they thought I was some random child trying to get in to see a famous ninja. However a bit of name dropping and back up from a medic who knew Sakura got me through.

"Kakashi-senpai?" I said hesitantly as I knocked on his half closed door.

He responded with a grunt. Unsure of his ambiguous response, I poked my head in the room. Kakashi-senpai, who was laying in bed, heavily bandaged and with several machines hooked up to him, lifted his head from the pillow. "Sekai-kun?" he asked blearily. I nodded, and he gestured for me to come in.

I did as he bade, and took a seat in the chair beside his hospital bed. Unsure of what to say, I kept my mouth shut until he broke the awkward silence.

"How did you know I was here?" he asked in a tone that made it clear he was also wondering _why_ I was here.

"I saw you when they were carrying you here." I replied, wetting my lips as my fingers tapped at my knees. "It was concerning."

"Ah."

Silence fell upon us once more, and this time I was the one who broke it. "How bad is it?"

He winced. "Pretty bad." It was clear he intended to leave it there, but I gave him a hard look, so he elaborated. "If I wasn't me, they wouldn't have bothered bringing back, and just made it as quick and painless as they could."

I sucked in breath through my teeth, and let out a stream of English curses. "How long will you be here?"

"Awhile." He groaned. "I hate it here, but even I know it would be suicide to leave before the end of the week."

"That's not too long." I encouraged, earning a snort in response. "What?"

"I'll probably be here for a couple months."

"What—why? Is it really that bad?"

"Sort of," he said, attempting to shrug a shoulder, but wincing at the movement. "They won't let me go home without supervision, and everyone I know well enough is out of the village for the foreseeable future."

"I see."

And then a thought struck me. _Don't do it, Sekai. Don't do it. Bad Idea,_ part of me screamed, but I opened my mouth regardless.

"I... am in village until Sensei returns." I blurted. _Abort! Abort!_

"...Sekai-kun?"

"Aside from my training, I am usually occupied with paperwork. Which can be done anywhere." I continued.

"Are you trying say what I think you are?" Kakashi asked, eyes wide and glassy.

"I... Suppose." I replied. "If you'd prefer it to the alternative."

And that was how I found myself temporarily moving into Hatake Kakashi's apartment four days later.

-x-

Looking back, I was fairly certain Kakashi-senpai must have been drugged out of his mind when he agreed to my proposal, and I wasn't quite sure what was wrong with me when I offered, but clearly something was.

Still, we went through the processes of convincing the medics that though I look like a five year old, I am actually seven and already a genin, thus I am perfectly capable of taking care of Kakashi-senpai while he is injured. I'm not sure they really thought it was a good idea, but they relented in the end. Likely because it freed up a bed for someone else.

When he was finally discharged from the hospital, we faced the problem of how to get him home. The man was too weak to make it back on his own—he could barely stand without support, and I was far too small to do so. We stood around outside like a pair of idiots while we tried to figure out how to get to his apartment. We must have been quite a sight—an obviously injured man only managing to stand with the support of a crutch and a small child.

After a bit of debate, Kakashi-senpai sighed as if he was about to do something he really preferred not so.

"Give me your hand," he ordered, holding his right hand. When I tentatively did so, I felt a strong zap through my chakra system.

"What the bloody fucking hell, putain! Asshole! Connard! Que-faites vous! You god damn bastard! Putain!" I swore in a mix of French and English. The older ninja just looked at me strangely.

"What did you do?" I repeated so he could understand me. He ignored me, and bit his thumb until it bled.

"Boar, dog, bird, monkey, ram, place your palm flat on the ground and step back." He instructed, smearing his blood on my hand. "This jutsu is chakra heavy. For it to work, you needed a bit of my chakra for it. I forced some into your system."

Hesitant, but trusting Kakashi-senpai, I did as be bade. With a puff of smoke, a huge, dark grey dog.

Oh. My. God. Instant Doggo!

"Hey Bull," Kakashi-senpai greeted. "I need you to help me back to my apartment and show Sekai-kun the way. By roof."

The dog nodded it's head, and lowered itself to its stomach. With my help, Kakashi-senpai mounted the dog, who stood.

I took a step back, and found that calling the beast huge was an understatement. Bull was taller than me! Then again, that was hardly saying much...

-x-

Kakashi-senpai's apartment wasn't what I expected. The wooden floor was all scratched up, and half the living room was dedicated to a pile of worn pillows and blankets, with a half dozen dogs sleeping on it. The remaining half was filled with a couch and a small coffee table. The kitchen was fairly standard, and rather clean, as was the bathroom.

"You have dogs." I commented. The man, who was settled on the couch, gave me a dead stare that seemed to say _no, really?_ I ignored it and approached the dogs. Their eyes opened, and I stopped just short of them, and held out my hand for them to sniff. "I'm Sekai. I'll be looking after Kakashi-senpai for awhile. May I pet you?"

The smallest one, I think it was a pug, came up to me, sniffed my hand, and gave what I thought was the dog equivalent of a shrug. "Sure." he said.

I blinked a few times, startled by the fact that he could talk, but reached out to pet him regardless.

"A little higher, right under the chin... yeah, that's it..." The pug mumbled, and a small smile pulled at my lips. "Yeah, I like you, pup. The name's Pakkun."

"Thank you. It's wonderful to meet you."

"So what's the story here, Kakashi?" The pug asked as he rolled over so I could rub his belly.

Kakashi-senpai sighed. "She's Kushina-nee's apprentice. They wouldn't let me out of the hospital without someone to supervise me at home, and everyone is out of the village at the moment, so she offered. She'll be staying with us for a few weeks."

"Right. Can you watch him for me while I fetch my things, Pakkun-chan?" I asked the adorable fur baby. "I won't be long."

"Sure." he nodded.

"You're really going to let her call you that?" Kakashi-senpai muttered as I walked out the door.

"Why not?" I heard Pakkun say just as it closed.

-x-

The logistics of staying with Kakashi-senpai were a bit awkward to work out.

Nominally, I was sleeping on the couch, but more often than not I ended up joining the dogs on the other side of the living room. The big one, who's name was Bull, took quite a liking to me, and would curl around me protectively as I slept.

As for my work space and storing my belongings... Well, Kakashi-senpai wasn't supposed to move much, and the meds I'd been instructed to give the man really knocked him out, so I was left to figure it out on my own.

It felt weird, like I was invading his space, even though really I was the one doing him a favour.

I still had no idea why I offered, and found myself really wishing that I hadn't.

But at the same time, it was nice not being alone all the time. The Kakashi-senpai's pack was always around and more than willing to be subjected to belly rubs and ear scratches. Ever since that mission out to Red Bean Country, I had barely seen my team, or anyone else really. I hadn't even had time to visit Hanako.

For someone who just over a year ago preferred solitude to the company of others, I felt pathetic about how lonely I was.

-x-

Three weeks into my stay with Kakashi-senpai, he had finally healed enough to be taken off the good stuff and move around a bit, which led to actually seeing and interacting with him and not just his dogs.

"Why are they keeping you in village?" he asked one day as I went through as much of my work out routine as I could in his apartment.

"Sensei is the village seal master," I explained, flipping onto my hands. "As her apprentice, I take over when she's gone."

"They're having you do that already?" My temporary roommate raised a silver eyebrow. "You must have a real talent for seals."

I did my best to shrug my shoulders while doing a hand stand, but it was a bit awkward.

"Maa," he sighed. "I suppose that's to be expected of Leaf's latest genius prodigy."

I scoffed. "I may be smart," I said as I shifted into a seated position. "But I'm not a genius."

There was a long stretch of silence where Kakashi-senpai just stared at me. "You really believe that, don't you?" he said, finally.

"Excuse me?"

"You really think you're not a genius." he repeated incredulously. "I don't know where you got the idea that you're anything but abnormally intelligent, but you're definitely a genius."

"Not really." I said awkwardly. I was, essentially, an adult in a child's body. "It hardly matters if I am or not, regardless."

"If you say so, Sekai-kun."

"...I need to go, I have a training session with Shisui-senpai." I said. "Don't do anything stupid. Pakkun-chan will tell me if you do. Right?"

"You got it, kid." The pug replied, and held his paw up for a high five, which I of course gave him.

"Traitor," Kakashi mumbled as he sent a one-eyed glare at his ninken. "You're not supposed to take other people's sides."

-x-

Training with Shisui-senpai was... interesting to say the least. While his younger cousin was teaching me to use simple genjutsu and how to best use them, Shisui-senpai was teaching me how to dispel the illusions. Which, despite my aptitude for casting genjutsu, was not something I excelled at.

To be frank, I fucking sucked.

Sure, I could notice if he made a sudden or obvious change in the environment, and then dispel it. But if it was something more subtle? Yeah, I couldn't tell where it started and where it ended.

"Sekai-chan..." Shisui lamented, a crestfallen expression upon face as he shook his head. "How can you be so _bad_ at this?"

I could feel the blood rush to my cheeks, and looked away. "Fuck off." I muttered. "I'm trying my best."

"I know you are, Sekai-chan." He agreed. "How about you tell me what it's like for you when you're under a genjutsu?"

"It really doesn't feel any different than usual." I admitted. "If something is obviously different, I can deduce that I've been placed under a genjutsu and break it, but your more subtle illusions? Where nothing overtly changes? I don't notice."

Shisui-senpai hummed in acknowledgement. "I see. Well then, I think I have an idea."

"Oh?" I prompted with a tilt of my head.

"Well, I'm on medical leave for the next few weeks or so, and you said you're in village for the foreseeable future, yeah?" I nodded. "Well then, you're going to meditate and focus on the flow of your chakra. And I," he puffed up dramatically. "Shall follow you around and cast genjutsu on you when you least suspect it. Eventually, as you familiarize yourself with the flow of your chakra, you should be able to detect my interference."

"What sort of genjutsu will you be using on me?" I questioned warily.

"Harmless stuff, don't worry." he dismissed. "Nothing that will interfere with your training and duties."

I let out a small sigh and agreed.

-x-

Meditation was boring. Initially, I believed I could go through my kata as I did so, but found that even that was distracting from my concentration on my chakra flow. Which meant that I basically had to be stationary while meditating. I could just imagine how much this was setting back reducing my skew, especially since I already had other factors negatively impacting it.

It was also difficult to keep my focus on my chakra _generally_. It was so boring—my mind kept drifting to ideas about how to figure out proofs I'd been having trouble with, sealing ideas, and, well. Anything, really.

It was frustrating. It sucked. I hated it. But it was important, so I did it.

Not that it seemed to do much good, though.

For example, one day I had a lesson with Shisui, and he led me around the extensive Uchiha owned land. He said that while I worked on detecting genjutsu via the alteration in my chakra flow, I should also work on detecting small inconsistencies, like smells and sounds. So he took me to a flower field and had me smell a bunch of flowers, then altered their appearance with genjutsu and had me guess at which flower it was by smell. When we were finished, I decided to take a carnation back with me, and sealed it away in my arm. When I returned to Kakashi-senpai's apartment, I unsealed it, only to find that there was no flower, only a taunting note mocking my difficulty with detecting genjutsu.

It was humiliating, especially when I had to explain to Kakashi-senpai why Uchiha Shisui was stalking me. (Of course he noticed, no matter that he was still far from fully recovered, and I had no idea when that stupid Uchiha was following me and when he wasn't.)

It was, however, an excellent motivator in regards to the meditation. And by the time it was five weeks into the new year, I was able to detect when Shisui-senpai's chakra was meddling with my mind more often than not.

Of course, instead of being proud of my achievements, he sulked. The little reprobate found joy in making a fool of me.

Though, I must admit, if I were in his position, I wouldn't behave much differently than him.

-x-

The first time I saw Aiko and Sakura since my stay at Kakashi-senpai's home was in early February, and a complete coincidence.

Since I'd finally made progress with detecting genjutsu, I decided to treat myself to some sweets at Suzuki Kashiya. I was enjoying an entire cake to myself when they entered the shop.

They didn't seem to notice me at first, so I let them order in peace, and then waved at them once they started to look for seating. They startled when they noticed me, and exchanged a look that I couldn't quite read. Nevertheless, I could tell that something was... off, to say the least, and gripped my knees.

"Hey," Aiko said with a half smile and awkward wave. "It's been awhile, huh?"

I nodded. "Yes, I've been extremely busy ever since Kushina-sensei was sent out."

"Oh?" Sakura said, her voice a tad higher than typical.

I nodded again. "Yes, I've taken over much of her sealing work for the village. I'm not sure how she does it all on top of teaching me, spending time with her family, and all that. How have the two of you been?"

"Busy." They replied in unison, despite having full mouths.

"Lots of hospital work, training and C-ranks." Sakura added once she swallowed.

"Yeah. I've been working closely with Kairi-sensei, and stuff."

"I figured." I replied. "I've missed you two, but I haven't seen you around much."

"Yeah..." Aiko mumbled awkwardly.

I licked my lips, and couldn't help but think they were avoiding me.

"I'd hoped to come here with the two of you for my birthday, a few weeks back, but I couldn't find either of you." I said, testing the waters.

"I-it was your birthday?" Sakura squeaked. "When?"

"A little over a month ago, on new year's eve."

"Oh! I'm sorry. I didn't know." My pink haired teammate cringed guiltily as she apologized.

"Yeah, sorry." Aiko said. "I wasn't even in the village."

"It's fine," I shook my head. "We've all been busy. But I need to get back to work. Sorry to cut this short."

"It's fine!" The two hurriedly chorused.

"It was lovely to see you," I said as I packed up the remainder of my cake. "Hopefully I'll see you soon."

With that, I left Suzuki Kashiya and headed for the training grounds.

I had thought Sakura and Aiko had been busy, and not had time, but after speaking with them it was obvious they were avoiding me. The only question was why? What had I done?

-x-

Notes: Poor Sekai. Just why are her friends avoiding her?

It amuses me to see that so far Shikamaru is winning the poll on my profile, since I already know he is definitely not ending up with Sekai. Behind him are Shisui, Itachi and Kakashi, though not in that order.

How does Kushina handle all the menial work that comes with being the village Seal Master? Shadow clones. Poor Sekai doesn't have that option.

Gotta admit, the mind control seal thing is a dig at a misogynist in the reviews. I'm sure you could recognize him if you look.

In other news, they've got Kakashi on the good stuff. I'm basing Sekai performing the technique for Kakashi on the fact that Kabuto did so for Orochimaru, if I remember correctly. If I'm wrong, oops, now it works that way. At least for Kakashi's summons. Because they're not like others. Yeah. Totally. (No really, I'll get into that later, though.)

Sekai is no worse at detecting genjutsu than most ninja. She was just expected to be better at it due to being a "genjutsu type."

This has now been cross posted to AO3. So if you prefer, head on over there. To those reading this on AO3, welcome to AtW! Thanks for reading.

This was barely proof read, sorry. I just wanted to publish it. Happy non-denominational winter holidays everyone!

Love, TheMathemagician

P.S. I will be posting a little... crack bonus story on new years. I decided to only publish it on AO3. The bonus story is just some humour, and not at all canon. It just sort of popped into my mind.


	15. Thirteen

Against The World

"Peace, whether personal or on a large scale, cannot last."

-x-

Sometimes, I wonder if this is my second life, or just the second one I can remember. If it wasn't the second, why didn't I remember any others? Had something gone wrong this time around?

I wasn't sure exactly how old I'd been before I died, but I think I'd been in my twenties.

Despite my physical age, I couldn't help count those years towards my actual age.

But it made me wonder. If this isn't only my second life, does that mean I should count the years from other lifetimes? Since I'm not counting just my current one? But then how old does that make me? Hundreds of years? Thousands? Only a few decades?

I don't know.

Even just counting this life and the one I remember, it makes things difficult. I've never been able to relate well to people my own age. I see them as children. I can't imagine ever dating someone my apparent age, I'd feel like a pedophile.

But the people who I could see myself dating, see me the way I see those children.

It makes me wonder if I'll end up alone.

But if this is just my second life, and I will remember every time I'm reborn, won't it just get worse and worse?

Won't I eventually consider myself to be hundreds or thousands of years old? Wouldn't I be even further away from everyone than I am now?

-x-

Thirteen

It was the end of February, and my time staying with Kakashi-senpai was coming to an end. He wouldn't be on active duty for another couple months, but by the end of the week he would hopefully be cleared to live solo.

To celebrate, I dragged him to the market to pick out his favourite foods, which I'd do my best to cook for him. For the most part Kakashi-senpai just trailed behind me quietly, but while I was examining eggplants, I noticed him speaking with another ninja.

Considering I had no idea what to look for in an eggplant, I just grabbed one and slunk over to the silver haired ninja's side.

"Oh? Who's this?" The bearded man he was speaking to asked. "They got you on babysitting duty, Kakashi?"

I scoffed. "Hardly. If anything, I'm babysitting _him_."

The man sent me a patronizing look, the kind you gave a kid when they told you they were going to be the next Hokage, that said _uhuh, sure kid,_ _you and everyone else_.

"Mah..." Kakashi-senpai sighed. "I'm afraid it's true. I've been on medical leave for the past few months, and Sekai-chan here, who is Kushina-nee's apprentice, has been looking after me."

"Hoshino Sekai. A pleasure to meet you." I greeted him, bowing perhaps a bit too shallowly.

"Sarutobi Asuma. Nice to meet you, kid." Sarutobi-san's gaze was no longer dismissive, but rather assessing. "You're Uzumaki-san's apprentice, huh?"

I inclined my head. _Wasn't that what Kakashi-senpai just said?_

"I've heard of you. Guess I'll be seeing you around. Later, Kakashi."

-x-

"How is it?" I asked at dinner that night. "Be honest."

"Well... you made a good effort," he began and paused. Likely for dramatic effect. "It's decent. Not the best, but enjoyable."

My lips curved into a small smile. "I'm glad. I'm not much of a cook, as you know."

Kakashi-senpai's single visible eye seemed to soften. "Eh, it's the thought that counts, right Sekai-chan?"

"Indeed." I agreed.

"You know, you've been more talkative the past few months than I would have thought." Kakashi-senpai commented. "You barely spoke when you've had dinner at Minato-sensei's house."

I shrugged. "I talk with you because it's enjoyable. Conversation with The Nui—" I faked a cough, and took a gulp of water, before correcting myself. "Conversation with Naruto is annoying. And when he's around he makes it hard to have a good conversation with other people."

"You don't like Naruto much, do you?"

I paused, unsure what to say. He considered The Nuisance to be his little brother after all. With a mental shrug, I decided to be honest. "He's annoying and unintelligent. I have no interest in that sort of person, and would prefer to avoid them. I haven't the patience for people who can't keep up with me to at least some extent."

Kakashi-senpai chuckled. "He can be a bitch much, huh? Don't tell sensei, but he can be really annoying sometimes. Still, he's family. But he's not really that stupid, Sekai-chan. You're just a genius."

"Hardly. I'm above average, at best." I dismissed. If he knew that I was mentally older than he was, he'd agree. But I couldn't tell him that. This was the second time he called me a genius, and it seemed he wasn't going to let go of it.

My temporary roommate frowned (I think?), and looked at me for a long moment. "I know you don't believe it, Sekai-chan. But you're smarter than most adults I know. Sometimes I forget you're a kid, despite your size."

"You better not be calling me small."

"Of course not." he placated.

-x-

I moved back to my own apartment two days later. To my dismay, it was covered in dust, and I had to sacrifice some library time to clean it and wash my bedding.

On the bright side, that night I slept in my own bed on fresh sheets, which was lovely.

Sadly, I was awakened only two hours after I'd gone to bed—which was at five in the morning.

"Guess who's back~!" a voice shrieked as my covers were torn away from me.

"...The fuck?" I mumbled in English, sitting up and rubbing my eyes. I glanced at my clock, which read quarter past seven, and saw a mass of red hair standing by my bed. "...Kushina-sensei? When did you get back?"

"Yup!" My red-headed teacher beamed. "I got back last night. C'mon, it's time to see how much of a mess you made as acting seal master while I was gone."

I sighed, gathered my things, and headed to my bathroom, where I took a quick shower and got dressed. I stepped out, gave a forlorn look at my bed, and followed Kushina-sensei through the streets to the tower.

Once we were settled in her office, we went straight to business. I summarized the work I'd done as acting Seal Master in her absence and showed her the seals I'd completed.

"How do you do this all on top of everything else?" I asked her once I'd finished.

Her lips twisted into what could only be described as an evil grin. "Shadow clones."

"Shadow clones?" I repeated in confusion.

"The most, like, awesome kind of clone ever, you know! Everything they do, you remember it once they dispel, they can use chakra and do, like, anything you know how to do."

" _That is so_ hax _._ " I grumbled in my native tongue. " _That jutsu is so OP_."

I needed it.

"...What?" Kushina-sensei blinked dumbly.

"Irrelevant. Can you teach me?" Though phrased as a question, it came out as more of a demand.

"Probably not a good idea, at the moment." she replied. "It's a chakra intensive jutsu, and has a pretty high physical energy cost. Even if you have enough to make one, which I'm not sure you do, it would leave you basically useless."

I visibly wilted. Of course. No OP jutsu hax for me.

Sensei sighed. "Don't look so down, kiddo. If you keep up your work I'm sure you'll be able to make one in a few years."

"Sure," I agreed halfheartedly. "How many can you make, anyway?"

"W-well, I'm like... I'm a bit of a special case, you see." Kushina-sensei chuckled nervously, scratching the back of her neck. "I have... like, a lot more chakra than pretty much anyone else in the village, and the Uzumaki tend to have more physical energy than most people... So, I can safely make, like, about thirty in a day... but beyond twenty I start to notice the drain."

I stared. What the hell. Making one could kill me—and I may be young and have severely skewed chakra, but I had above average reserves for a genin—but she could make thirty?

That... there was something I didn't know about Kushina-sensei. There had to be.

With business out of the way, sensei dragged me back to the Uzumaki residence for lunch.

"Um. Sensei?"

"Yes, Sekai-chan?" the redhead answered absently as she prepared sandwiches.

"I... wanted to apologize for how I behaved the last I was over for dinner with you." I took a deep breath. "I shouldn't have let my emotions get to me like that, and remained polite."

Sensei sighed, and set down the knife she was using to cut crusts off and turned to face me. The expression on her face was warm and gentle.

"Sekai-chan, there's nothing to forgive." she assured me, resting a comforting hand on my shoulder.. "Your feelings about Jiraiya-sensei are understandable, given your experiences. I won't hold it against you, nor will Minato, and we won't force you to be around him, kay?"

I nodded. "Still, I was very rude, and confrontational."

"Maybe, but you're hardly the first person to lose their temper in this house. It's fine okay? Don't worry about it."

"...Alright."

"This has been bothering you, huh?"

I swallowed. "I was worried that you wouldn't come home, an-and the last time I'd seen you I'd been..."

"Oh, Sekai-chan!" Kushina-sensei wailed and pulled me into a hug. "Even if something like that happens again, I'll forgive you, okay? You're my precious student, after all."

Hesitantly, I returned the embrace. "Thank you, sensei."

"Now, is there anything else bothering you? You can talk to me about anything, you know."

"Well, I think Aiko and Sakura are mad at me, and I don't know why."

Sensei frowned. "What makes you think that?"

I shrugged a single shoulder, and avoided her gaze. "I didn't see them much while you were gone. I assumed it was because they were as busy as I was, however, then I ran into them a few weeks ago, and the way they behaved indicated they were upset with me, and avoiding me."

"Honestly, the best thing you can do is talk to them." she advised. "I know that kind of advice sounds unhelpful, but it's really all you can do, if you want to fix things."

She was right, and I knew it. "Okay. Thanks."

She reached over and ruffled my hair. "Anytime."

-x-

It was another week before I saw Aiko and Sakura again. Now that sensei was back and I was no longer babysitting Kakashi-senpai, team training had resumed. Our first session was led by Kushina-sensei, and it was awkward, to say the least.

As she ended the practice, sensei gave me a look, that I interpreted to mean she wanted me to speak to my teammates.

"Sakura, Aiko, can we talk?" I asked before they could leave like they clearly wanted to. The two exchanged a look, but agreed.

"Sure." Aiko said, her arms crossed over her chest. "What is it?"

My fingers tapped against my thigh restlessly. "Are you two upset with me?"

Aiko's neutral expression morphed into a scowl. "Do you really have to ask?"

I lifted my chin. "Yes. I do. Because I don't know what I could have possibly done to upset you."

She scoffed, and Sakura's expression was equally disbelieving. "Are you serious?"

"Yes."

"Oh, I don't know!" My blonde teammate exploded. "Maybe you completely ignored us on the last mission we went on, and then avoided us for months!"

I blinked dumbly. "I—that's—what are you talking about?"

"Don't play dumb, Sekai." Sakura spoke up. "We all know you're far from it."

I shook my head. "I honestly have no idea what you're talking about. I didn't—that mission we had, I wasn't ignoring you. At least not on purpose," I explained. "I was upset—I'd had a big fight with Kushina-sensei the night before, and I was just...

"And I wasn't avoiding you, I was busy! With sensei out of the village, I was acting Seal Master, and I took over all the administration and a lot of the R&D work."

"If you weren't avoiding us, why didn't you ever answer your door? We stopped by loads of times!" Sakura argued, though with less fire than she had before.

"I wasn't living there for months. Kakashi-senpai was severely injured, and needed someone to supervise his recovery, so I was staying with him."

"...Oh."

"Still, you could have told us!"

"When? If I wasn't working or taking care of senpai, I was training. And it's not like I knew where either of you were." I defended myself.

"You could have stopped by one of our places!"

We carried on like that in circles for ages, until eventually we got everything we were thinking out.

In the end, the two older girls felt guilty they hadn't realized something was wrong and that I wasn't just ignoring them on that mission, and I realized that it wasn't normal to just not communicate or make much of an effort to for months just because I was busy.

"I don't know what I expected, really," Aiko commented once things were settled. "You're brilliant, but socially you're a moron."

All I could do was shrug, since she wasn't wrong. Before Aiko I never spent time with anyone but Hanako, who'd just always been there. Additionally, it wasn't like either of us needed to make an effort to see each other before the last few months. We either saw each other regularly at school or for training.

"In the future I'll attempt to at the very least inform you I'm otherwise occupied." I promised.

"And we'll try to take into the account the fact that you have no social skills in the future." Sakura added wryly.

And that was that.

-x-

Over the next few weeks, I noticed that Kushina-sensei was different. The last time she came back after being away she'd been exhausted, but this was something else. It was hard to put my finger on it, but eventually I concluded that she was always on edge, never relaxed, like she was expecting an attack at any moment.

Would that be me, someday? (Probably)

I did my best to ignore it, to pretend that nothing had changed, and she seemed to appreciate that.

After the whole misunderstanding with my teammates, I tried to visit Hanako more as well. Because though I knew she understood why my visits were infrequent, Sakura and Aiko made me realize I could still make more of an effort.

To my surprise, however, Hanako was nearly as busy as I was, if in a different way. Whenever I stopped in, she had piles of paperwork strewn across her hospice room. She seemed harried a lot of the time, but she always had a warm smile for me when I made it to visit.

My visits weren't always as long as they had been in the past, and some times we didn't speak much, but I could tell she was glad to have me around.

Hanako wasn't the only relationship I tried harder to maintain though. After living with Kakashi-senpai for months, I had come to consider him a friend, too, and so I tried to stop by and visit him and the dogs as well.

Currently, they were the only two I needed to try with at the moment, since I was once again regularly seeing my teammates in training and missions, and I saw Itachi-senpai and Shisui-senpai for genjutsu lessons semi-frequently.

My lessons with Shisui-senpai had finally progressed past him randomly trapping me in genjutsu, as I could now sense it whenever he did. He'd seemed very upset about that, but that was just because he enjoyed my embarrassment.

Our lessons now focused on genjutsu that were difficult to dispel even if you did detect them.

"You can't just disrupt your chakra to get out of this sort of genjutsu," he had explained. "You have to find the exact location of my chakra in your pathways and disrupt _that_."

It was trickier than it sounded, too. While his previous lessons helped with detecting foreign chakra in my system, it was harder to pinpoint its exact location, as there were hundreds of minuscule pathways in my brain.

I felt bad about how difficult it was, but after Itachi-senpai mentioned that the sort of genjutsu Shisui-senpai was using were S-rank, and few ninja could break out of them without the aid of a bloodline, I felt a lot better about it.

Itachi-senpai was still teaching me preset illusions, but he was having me focus more on what my chakra was doing when I cast them, to get an idea of what exactly it was doing. This included doing so while sparring, which still seemed impossible to me, even after several practice sessions, both with senpai and with Sakura and Aiko.

Team practices with Sakura were getting scary. She was creating craters with each punch, and was so used to using her chakra to enhance her hits, that sometimes she forgot to let up when sparring with us. This resulted in more than a few broken bones, which at least served as practice healing for the pink haired medic.

Aiko, meanwhile, had gotten better with her taijutsu, and learned several earth ninjutsu. Kairi-sensei had the three of us practice defensive maneuvers incorporating said jutsu, and combo attacks.

Team training was becoming brutal, and I couldn't help but wonder if it had to do with the way things were getting worse with the war.

-x-

"Alright, it's time to start you on one of the Uzumaki clan's secret jutsu!" Kushina-sensei declared one morning when we met for training at her home. "Let's go out back." she said, and gestured for me to follow her, which I obediently did, only to pause when I caught sight of the yard.

Spread across her back lawn were piles of huge chains.

"Sensei?"

She smirked, and flung her arm out to point at the chains. "The first step is to channel your chakra into these chains. Don't worry, they're made of chakra absorbing metal."

"..Why?" I asked.

"You'll see. Now hop to it! It'll take awhile! They have to be completely saturated in your chakra!" Kushina ordered with a manic gleam in her eyes.

Without further comment, I plopped down near the pile and began pumping my chakra into the chains as she demanded.

In the end it took me two weeks to finish saturating them with my chakra, and only then did Kushina-sensei tell me what they were for.

"You know how I have my chakra chains as part of my bloodline limit, right?" Sensei said. "Well, this is how they started.

"The next step is to create a seal to store them. Usually my clansmen had the seal somewhere on their body. But before we worry about that, we need to design the seal on paper, first."

I nodded in understanding. We were both sitting on the lawn, surrounded by chains thrumming with my chakra.

"Each clansmen started with the base seal," Kushina-sensei lectured as she placed piece of paper in front of me with an inactive seal. "Then built on it for their own needs.

"Now, I'm sure you're wondering how these things are used. The seal allows you to connect them to your chakra pathways, and thus to control them like a limb. It's a bit more complicated than that, but that's the idea. Anyway, the chains are then used as they are for attacks, or as conduits for various jutsu."

"Fucking sweet." I whispered to myself.

-x-

The mission wasn't anything new. We'd done several like it before. It was a simple run to one of the outposts to deliver supplies. Tsunade-sensei was leading us for the first half of the mission, and Kairi-sensei, who was at the outpost, would switch out with her for the trip back.

There were no problems on the way to the outpost near Pond Country—we made the trip in two and a half days, which was a reasonable time frame to travel almost five hundred kilometres for a team of genin. Once we arrived at the outpost, I unsealed the storage scrolls from my arm and passed them to the jounin in charge while Tsunade-sensei took Sakura to the medical station. Aiko and I checked in with Kairi-sensei, and then I drew up various types of storage seals for the ninja on base, according to what the jounin commander asked for.

The next morning Kairi-sensei asked me to store a couple of sensitive documents in my arm, once I'd done so, the four of us took off.

In order to avoid a major battle that the three of us genin weren't ready for, Kairi-sensei had us take a detour that brought us fairly close to Meadow Country.

"God dammit." Kairi-sensei hissed after a few hours of travel. "We've got three chuunin incoming, four o'clock."

"Orders, sensei?" Aiko asked, though we all knew what sensei would say. This wasn't the first time something like this had happened. In retrospect, we would realize this is where things started to go bad, but at the time it didn't seem like a big deal.

"The three of you keep going along the route planned, full speed. I'll take care of these three and then catch up with you. Understood?"

"Yes, ma'am." the three of us chorused.

"Good, now go!" Kairi-sensei shouted as she unsealed her spear and jumped down from the tree.

"Aiko, you set the pace." Sakura ordered, since Aiko had the worst stamina. "Sekai and I will match you."

"Right." Aiko nodded. She sped up and took the lead. I let Sakura follow behind her, and took the rear.

We travelled that way for nearly three hours, hopping from tree to tree. But the longer we travelled, the more anxious we became.

"Stop for a rest." I suggested when I noticed Aiko slowing down.

"Are you sure? We're still really close to the border with Meadow." the Yamanaka fretted.

"It's fine. You need to rest and replenish your strength." Sakura agreed.

Aiko nodded reluctantly, and the three of us retreated to the ground.

We each took out our water bottles and a niNRG bar, and collapsed on the ground in a tight circle.

"I'm glad we have you on this team, Sekai." Aiko said around a mouthful of the meal replacement. "My cousin was so jealous when he found out I have a seal that keeps my water cold."

"It is convenient." The medic in training agreed. "And we can carry enough for weeks, too."

We continued to make small talk as we rested, but after an hour we were starting to grow anxious.

"It's already been about four hours since sensei sent us ahead." I hedged.

"Yeah." Aiko agreed.

"Usually she's caught up with us by now." Sakura added.

The fact that we'd been stationary for a quarter of that time went unsaid.

"...We should get moving." I said as I stood.

"Yeah."

And that was when things really went wrong.

"Ninja art: Binding Web!" I heard someone shout before the three of us were covered in a sticky white substance that pinned my teammates to the ground and myself face first to a tree.

Before I knew it, I felt pain in the back of my head, and I faded out of consciousness.

-x-

The first time I woke up, the only thing that registered was pain and something digging into my wrists and ankles before I drifted off again.

The second time I woke, I was being dragged along by two men. The sound of their footsteps and the clanging of the chains around my ankles against the floor echoed through the hall.

"Good, she's awake."

Abruptly, I was shoved into a chair. One of the men fastened my shackles to the chair, and the other left, a heavy metal door slamming behind him.

The remaining man circled around me. "Well, well, well. What do we have here?" he sneered. "Looks like it was a team of little girls who stole the key. And just where is it, hm? Is it in one of those seals?" He traced the seal on my inner thigh, and I realized I was naked. "Or have you already passed it on?"

I blinked in confusion, but remained silent. _What key?_

"Not gonna talk? That's fine. I have other methods." He smirked, and took my face in his hands. I stared back at him, waiting for him to make his next move. He closed his eyes. And then I screamed.

I wasn't sure what he did, but it felt like my head was being split open.

"God fucking dammit!" he shouted, and tried to throw me to the ground, but my restraints held me in place. "No wonder the three of you were sent. You've all fucking immune. Tch. Our fucking luck. Looks like we'll have to do this the hard way."

-x-

Notes: Honestly, the Shadow Clone jutsu splitting your chakra evenly makes very little sense with the way Naruto uses it in canon. He makes loads of clones all the time—if he makes 99 clones, he is left with 1% of his total chakra. Regardless of how much chakra that is, it's still ridiculously wasteful. What it comes down to is that Kishi didn't think that through, so I'm making changes to the mechanics of it. And nerfing it to some extent. Also, what pisses me off about other fics and the shadow clone jutsu, is that they have Kakashi or someone say Naruto can't teach Sakura the jutsu because the chakra cost would kill her. (Speaking of genin Naruto and Sakura) Like... you're literally saying she'd die without half her chakra. That makes no sense. Sure she doesn't have a lot of chakra as a genin, but if the jutsu has a proportional chakra cost instead of a fixed cost, then she would be able to do it just fine. She'd be capable of at least a clone or two. It's stupid and illogical, and basically just perpetuated as fanon. And it's bad fanon, at that. I urge any writers reading this to avoid using it.

Tl;dr: the mechanics of the shadow clone jutsu in canon make no sense, and most fanfic writers are just as stupid about it as Kishi. Sorry not sorry.

Yeah, their fight was basically a misunderstanding and just regular drama. Sekai wasn't without fault, but she really didn't realize that it's not okay to just not make an effort to spend time with people you care about because you're busy, or not even tell them that. She just has shitty social skills, and Aiko and Sakura jumped to the conclusion that Sekai was being a bitch by ignoring them and avoiding them, without considering that something was wrong, and then that she just didn't know how to maintain a relationship when you don't see someone everyday anyways. For Sekai, she goes ages without seeing Hanako with little explanation, and Hanako doesn't hold that against her or comment on it. To Sekai you don't need to see someone very often to be friends with them. Furthermore, Aiko and Sakura didn't realize anything was wrong on that mission, because other than basically ignoring them, it didn't seem like anything was off. Sekai's typical lack of expression makes it hard to judge how she's feeling unless she says something.

The current (Genin) arc has just a couple more chapters left! Which means I've been busy planning the next arc. I spent like three hours in my room with my laptop open, my maps open, and notebooks spread all over making notes and brain storming. I've got some ideas, but is there anything you'd like to see?

Also, I've come to a decision about ships for this fic. I'm still not sure if I'll include them, but they're picked out for if I do. They could still change, but who knows? I will say that Sekai's potential ship is not with any of the canon rookie nine. If it happens, it won't be a major part of the story.

Pond Country is the canonically unnamed country Hidden Waterfall is in, and Meadow is the unnamed country Hidden Grass is in. I named them. There is a rough world map on the sekai-against-the-world tumblr. Eventually I'll post a more detailed one, but it is currently a WIP.

All the best,

The Mathemagician


	16. Fourteen

Against the World

"I don't know what was worse—what was done, or how I felt about it"

-x-

Wait. Wasn't she...

"Aren't you the crabby medic that did my pre-academy medical?" I asked Tsunade-sensei.

"Yeah—hey who are you calling crabby, you little brat?" Tsunade snarled. I stared at her, unimpressed. She sighed. "What about it?"

"If you're the top medic, why did you do my pre-academy exam?"

"I was on leave, and there wasn't anyone else available."

"Oh."

-x-

Fourteen

"Oh my god, Sekai!" Aiko cried when I was dumped in a cell three hours later as both she and Sakura scrambled over to me, their chains clanging against the ground. She took in my bloody hands and bruised face. "What did they do to you?"

"He—my head hurt... and then he got angry... Immune, he said. All. I—I don't... and then my fingernails, and _questions..._ " I whimpered. "Wh-what's happening?"

"Shh..." Sakura hushed. "It's going to be okay."

"That one guy is from the Satoi clan from Rock." Aiko explained in a whisper. "They're similar to the Yamanaka—they're mind readers."

"...Immune?" I mumbled.

"Why didn't it work?" my blonde teammate whispered. I nodded. "As a Yamanaka, we're all taught ways to protect our minds from foreign influence."

"I..." Sakura bit her lip as Aiko and I focused on her. "I have a... I call her 'Inner.' She's me. But she's separate, too. She protected me."

"Really?" Aiko breathed. "Fascinating. It's never stopped me from..."

"Never stopped you from what?" Sakura hissed. "Have you been _fucking with our head?_ "

Was that her 'Inner' speaking...? I shook my head. I'd ask later. (If there was a later.)

"Calm down, Sakura! Let me explain." the Yamanaka pleaded.

"Fine."

"It's not on purpose." she whispered guiltily. "You know how clans with secret techniques can eventually develop a bloodline limit? Well, obviously I can't say much right now, but... I've manifested one, but I can't control it. It's um... It's a passive ability. I can..." she glanced above her nervously. Perhaps that was the exit? The ceiling? It was too dark for me to tell.

"You can..." Sakura prompted stiffly.

"I can read surface thoughts."

I inhaled sharply.

"I try to avoid it." she added hastily, turning her gaze to me, and I realized her glasses were missing. "It's one of the reasons why I like to spend time with you, Sekai. Even if I accidentally read your mind, I can't understand it at all. It's all jumbled. I'm guessing that's why they didn't get anything from you either."

I frowned. "I want to try something. Do your thing."

"What, I just told you..."

"Just do it, okay?"

"Alright..." Aiko agreed. She looked me in the eye, and even in the dim light I saw the blue of her eyes slowly contract to pinpricks on black. _**Can you understand me now?**_ I thought in this world's language. Aiko gasped, and nodded.

 _ **This can be very useful.**_ I thought at her.

"How did you—no. Tell me later."

"What?" Sakura glanced between us. "What did I miss?"

"It's not important right now." I dismissed. "Do you know what they want?

Aiko nodded.

-x-

Between the three of us, we worked out what was going on.

A team of infiltration specialists from Leaf had managed to learn or steal the key to the code Rock ninja were using to encrypt their messages. The Rock ninja stationed in he Land of Meadows found out, and were hunting them down. When they found us near the border to Meadow and far from any (known) Leaf encampments, they assumed the three of us were the infiltration team, based partially on our young ages, sexism, and the fact that Aiko is fairly obviously a Yamanaka. The fact that none of our minds were readable enforced their belief. We weren't sure if there was something physical the other team had taken, that was used to decode their messages, or if they had just memorized something.

The cell we were in had no doors or windows. According to Aiko, we were dropped in from above. In the time I'd been questioned, the two of them discovered that the walls repelled chakra, so there was no walking up them with chakra, and they were oddly slippery and smooth, so there was no way to get a good enough grip to climb up the hard way. To make matters worse, our chakra was sluggish and difficult to command.

"A common drug to use on prisoners," Sakura whispered. "It numbs your chakra receptors, so signals from the brain don't reach them, and you can't consciously mould chakra. Involuntary chakra flow and activity is uninterrupted."

That meant that while natural processes continued, including Aiko's passive bloodline limit, I was unable to open either of the storage seals on my body.

There was little three little girls being held by high level enemy ninja could do.

But we were three highly intelligent little girls, with a medic, a mind reader, and a mathematician between us.

-x-

"Come on, Se-ka-i-chan." The Satoi man, whom I decided call Fuck Face, cooed. "Can't you just tell us if the key is in your seals, or just your head? Your _friends_ were already nice enough to tell me you were the only one who knows anything."

I ignored him, as I did each time they took me for questioning. It was only me they took, now. Sakura and Aiko had claimed that I was the mastermind, the one who solved the code.

They were lucky to be alive. Fuck Face and the other Rock ninja were only keeping them that way as leverage against me.

He traced the seal on the inside of my thigh. "Come now, can't you at least tell us how it works?"

I ignored him.

His fingers slowly drifted up my thigh. "You're a pretty one, you know?" He purred in my ear. "Such exotic colouring. If you won't tell me, maybe we can have some fun?"

I whimpered.

"Oh? You don't want to?" I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head. "Then maybe you should tell me how to open these?" he paused. "Well, why don't I leave you here to think about it, huh?"

He left.

I took I deep breath. I could do this. Team Four was getting out of here. There were no other options.

Fuck Face leered at me when he returned. "Well?" he asked, playing with the waist of his pants deliberately. "Anything to say?"

"Nine drops of blood on each seal." I rushed out. "Then I need to use my chakra to draw the opening sequence with it."

He grinned. "Good girl. You've earned a rest."

-x-

Over the next few interrogation sessions, I carefully implied that I had the key in my seal and that I was dragging things out on purpose, buying time for my superior to access the pocket dimension it was kept in through her own linked seal.

And that was how I ended up chained down in the interrogation room with my chakra unsealed and four large men watching my every move.

"Now, you know better than to try anything, don't you sweetie?" Fuck Face cooed at me. I nodded, and had him drop my own blood on my arm.

I took a deep breath, and started moulding my chakra. The blood on my arm started to slowly trace a pattern around the seal.

And then the men dropped to the ground. Immediately, I drew a low output explosion seal on the shackles, using my blood. It was a poor substitute for sealing ink, but it could conduct chakra and worked in a pinch. With a small flicker of my chakra, the chains broke. Quickly I unsealed a kunai and slit the throats of Fuck Face and the other three men before they could break out of the genjutsu I'd cast.

With the immediate threat gone, I stripped the Rock nin of their shirts, then sealed their bodies away. I slipped one of the shirts on, and made a break for the holding cell. There were two guards near the trap door, but I took them out with a couple well-aimed kunai before they could see me. (Thank fuck they were standing still.) With them out of the way, I sketched a linked explosion seal onto the ground with their blood.

I shoved their corpses off the trap door and slid it open. I jumped down and used a seal drawn with the blood remaining on my kunai to break Sakura's and Aiko's chains. I handed them two of the shirts I'd brought with me, and they quickly pulled them on. While my shirt went down past my knees, theirs only barely made it to their thighs. Still, it was better than nothing.

I took their hands and sent a small jolt of my own chakra into their system, stimulating the chakra receptors the way Sakura told me too. They both let out a pained cry—my raw chakra did the job, but it did it more painful and damaging than medical chakra. With free access to our chakra, we were able to jump up through the trap door.

Once free of the cell, Aiko took the lead, having found the exit route in the mind of one of the rock ninja she manipulated into thinking of it. We stuck to the ceiling, crawling across it under an AoE genjutsu Sakura cast that helped us blend in.

There were a couple close calls, but a quick genjutsu on my part kept them subdued, since we couldn't afford to leave bodies lying behind us, lest someone stumble upon them and realize there was a prison break.

And then we were free. And surrounded by a rocky terrain of reddish brown sandstone. We didn't bother paying attention to which direction we ran, we just focused on putting enough distance between us and the enemy base.

"Stop." I ordered, and pulled out the second part of my linked explosive seal. With a quick pulse of chakra, I activated the seal. "Boom." I said as I watched the Rock base go out in a fiery death.

"Where the fuck are we?" Aiko wondered.

"Earth Country, I figure." Sakura replied.

"Obviously, I meant where in it are we?" Aiko huffed.

"Doesn't matter. We should head south, southwest ish." I said, unsealing my compass. "We can pass through Storm or Cliff Country to get to Wind, then head east through River and back to Fire country. Going through Meadow or Pond would get us killed."

"What do you mean?" Sakura asked.

"Meadow is enemy territory, so going through it would be a horrible decision. But if we head north east to Pond, we end up close to Hidden Rock, and would likely end up being caught by ninja moving between Earth and Meadow."

"Good point." Sakura nodded.

"Let's get going. We should put some more distance before we clean up."

-x-

We ran south until nightfall, and then found a small cave to rest in. The ceiling was low—it was a bit cramped for Aiko, who was the tallest of us, but it was good enough. We debated lighting a fire, but in the end decided it was too risky. Instead, I unsealed a large pail of water from my arm, and we used the fourth shirt as a washcloth to get rid of most of the dirt and grime from our run through Earth Country and captivity. Once we were relatively clean, Sakura took time to heal our bloody and burned feat.

"Do you have any clothes and stuff in your seal, Sekai?" Sakura asked.

"I have a spare shirt and shorts, but that's it. Well, that and a few pairs of underwear—but they'd be way too small for both of you." They nodded. I was beyond small for my age, and only roughly came up to their shoulders. I suspect mother might have had poor nutrition while pregnant with me or when breastfeeding. Considering she had no idea she was pregnant, it wasn't surprising. She may have dieted at first, simply believing she was getting fat.

"I feel so stupid—I should have thought to seal at least _shoes._ "

"Well, neither of us thought to either." Sakura consoled. "You can't think of everything. When we get back you can seal shoes and clothes for all three of us."

"In the mean time, we should find a small village and send Sekai in to get some clothes for us." Aiko suggested.

"With what money?" I asked. "I didn't really have money to spare to seal away—I spend most of it on gear and supplies."

"Steal it." Sakura chimed in. "Use a genjutsu to make them think you've paid for stuff."

"Very well." I nodded. "In the mean time, do either of you know roughly where we are? And what villages might be close?" We didn't really cover much foreign geography in the academy, and it wasn't something sensei focused on.

"Well, we must be on the Red Plateau." Aiko hummed. "I think the dropping point is just across the border with Wind. Wait, no, with Cliff, not Wind."

"The Red Plateau doesn't have any villages on it—the land is unfarmable, and it's bone dry. No bodies of water. Basically uninhabitable." Sakura added. "We'd be screwed if Sekai didn't seal away so much water and niNRG bars."

"So our best bet is to get to the drop off point, and then..." I trailed off.

"I think there's a river east of it." Aiko said. "There are usually a lot of small villages along rivers, so if we follow it we should eventually come across them. But we should avoid Storm country, I hear they don't like outsiders, and have some way of knowing when undesirable people cross the border."

"So we continue south for now, and then east." I summarized.

With a plan in place, we decided to do three, three hour shifts for night watch. I volunteered for the middle shift. With only a single blanket and no fire, the three of us huddled close to share body heat.

-x-

The next day I changed into my spare shirt and shorts, and we tore up the one I'd been wearing to wrap around our feet to help prevent burns from the scalding heat of the stone beneath us on the plateau.

We travelled in silence, not wanting to use up our energy speaking instead of running. Progress was slower than we'd anticipated. In Fire country, we were able to jump from tree to tree, and until this trek I didn't realize just how much slower running on the ground was. It took us two more days of travel to finally reach the drop point.

The slope down was beyond steep and it must have been at least a kilometre long. Not wanting to risk our safety for speed, the three of us slowly made our way down, using chakra on our hands and feet to adhere to the surface.

One we finally reached the bottom the sun was starting to set, so instead of heading east right away, we searched for a defensible area to sleep in for the night. When there was none to be found nearby, Sakura punched a small hole in the slope with her enhanced strength, and then a larger one further in and to the left. Aiko reinforced the cave we made with an earth jutsu, and we settled in for the night.

The next morning, we ran towards the river, avoiding Cliff country's hidden village and the larger towns. Large towns meant more people, and until we were back in Fire country, it was best we avoided them.

Half a day's trek from the plateau we found a village to "shop" at. It was small, but not so small that outsiders were rare. About a kilometre away from it, I unsealed some water to wash away most of the grime on my skin, and twisted my hair into a bun secured with a stick from the nearby bushes. When I was as presentable as possible, I left my teammates hiding in the bushes as I approached the town on the thin trail civilians used for travel.

Once I stepped inside the town's boarder, I kept my eyes peeled for somewhere to "purchase" clothes for Aiko and Sakura. Finally, on the other side of the village from where I entered, I found a small clothing store that was empty save for the woman at the till and a teenage girl.

A bell above the door jingled as I stepped inside, drawing the attention of the employee. "Hello, welcome to the Silver Thimble." she greeted. "Is there anything I can help you with? I haven't seen you in town before, my dear."

"I don't think I'll need any help." I replied. "My sisters and me are just passing through, but our clothes are a bit worn from all our travelling adventures." I widened my eyes and tried to make a smile that didn't look too forced. I was trying to appear childlike and innocent, since my small stature made me look a few years younger than I actually was. "Sara-nee-chan and Ai-nee-chan said it was my job to pick something out for them while they take care of other things."

"Well, I'm sure you'll do a good job for them, sweetie. If you need any help, don't be shy."

"Thanks!" I replied, looking away as if embarrassed. Once the woman was done speaking with me, I hurried further into the store. There weren't a lot of options, and most of the clothes weren't as durable as even the cheapest of ninja quality, but I made do.

I picked up three pairs of the sturdiest looking boots in the correct sizes for the three of us and three pairs of socks. I then picked out two simple t-shirts and shorts for Aiko and Sakura. Unfortunately they didn't seem to sell underwear, strangely enough. Looking around, I also grabbed three white cloaks in case we had to travel through the desert.

With everything picked out, I browsed around until the other shopper left. Once alone with the woman behind the counter, I slowly made my way over to her.

"That's quite a bit, dear. Are you sure you can carry it all?"

I nodded and hummed. "It's okay! It won't be for long."

"Well then, let's ring you up..." While she rung me up and folded the clothes and placed them in paper bags, I cast a small genjutsu to make her forget about payment. Once everything was packed away in the bags, I allowed myself a small smirk as I left the shop.

With my purchases in hand, I quickly left the village and returned to the bushes Sakura and Aiko hid in.

"I kept it basic, a shirt and pair of shorts for either of you, boots and socks for all three of us. There was no underwear, though. And I grabbed these cloaks for the desert." I explained as I unpacked the stolen goods.

"Who cares that there was no underwear, at least we won't be half naked anymore." Aiko dismissed as she tugged on her shorts.

"What she said." Sakura agreed while she changed her top.

"Can you heal our feet again before we put on the socks and shoes?" I asked while I unwrapped the ragged cloth from my raw feet.

"For sure." Sakura agreed, adjusting her hair. "Do either of you think you could cut my hair off? There's no fixing this mess."

I nodded and pulled out a kunai and settled behind Sakura. I ran my hands over her head and hair, looking for the best place to cut off the mess, but keep a decent length. Unfortunately, I had to cut it right at the nape of her neck, leaving only a couple inches of her pink hair. I did my best to even things out, and while it ended up being a bit choppy, it would do. Hair grows back.

"Thanks." Sakura smile, and turned around to face me. Her hands lit up with green medical chakra, and she healed first my damaged feet, and then her own. Aiko sat down next to us for her turn, and asked me to cut her hair too. I scooted behind her cut her hair, which had grown out a bit and tangled, while Sakura healed her. Once the two of us were done, I gave the kunai to Aiko and pulled the twig securing the bun out of my hair. Without a word, Aiko cut off my hair too.

After pulling on our socks and boots, we sat in silence, except for the faint sound of my fingers tapping against my knees.

"We can't follow the river the whole way." Aiko said. "It curves into Storm for a bit. The curve is just east of the capitol."

"We should move southwest a bit then. Not too far west though. Cross into Wind, and then head south to the river again. Then we can follow the main roads, which should take us into River." Sakura rubbed her chin thoughtfully.

"Are you sure the main roads would be safe?" I asked.

"They should be." Aiko agreed. "By then we'll be far enough away from Earth country that it's unlikely any enemies will be around. We'll be deep enough into neutral territory."

"Very well." I said as I stood. "We should start moving again. Oh, we should stop by the river first, though. So I can seal away more water before we hit the desert."

-x-

Over the next two days, we moved through Cliff country, avoiding the capitol, and then into the desert of Wind country, where our progress slowed. The white cloaks protected us from the sun's damaging rays, but they didn't exactly keep us cool either. The three of us were sweating buckets, and on top of all that, we weren't used to travelling on sand. It was oddly soft, and it shifted beneath our feet.

After the first day, we decided to sleep during the day and travel at night. During the day, Aiko dug us a hole in the ground with an earth jutsu, and hardened the hole with another. Since the desert was inhabited by many small, deadly creatures, we returned to our three hour watch rotation, so which ever of us was awake could kill or chase off anything that came near.

The nights were cold, but it was better than travelling in the heat. At the least, our movements built up heat and the cloaks we initially wore for protection from the sun became cloaks to keep us warm. It was still chilly, but manageable.

It took us four more days to reach the river again. From there, we followed down until we came across a bridge. After crossing it, we were on a dusty, pale brick road that led to Wind's capitol.

Not wanting to risk anything, the three of us veered off the path to travel around the capitol, and then returned to the brick road. We continued eastward, and decided to pass through the next town down the road, since it was a trading town on the border of Wind and River, and it was busy enough to lose ourselves in the crowds.

From there we took to the trees lining the main path, hastening our travel. When we came to a fork in the road, we turned north and travelled along the west side of River Country's only lake, then turning east and walking along the northern bank. And then, we were _finally_ back in Fire Country.

With renewed energy, we trekked through the highlands, crossing over one of Fire Country's wider rivers, and skirting around Lake Tobirama, which was only a short distance from Hidden Leaf.

-x-

We shouldn't have been surprised that our arrival at the village gates led to us being taken down to the Torture and Interrogation building. (It was our own village, somewhere we thought we could finally be safe.)

We shouldn't have been surprised we had been gone for over two months. (The first month and a half of our absence covered our stay in the Rock base, and then the next three weeks covered our escape.)

We shouldn't have been surprised that we were labelled killed in action. (They labelled us missing for the first four weeks, and then decided we must be dead, since three little girls who didn't make it home from the northern edge of Fire Country, which should have taken only a couple days, couldn't _possibly_ have survived on their own for that long, regardless of who their teachers were.)

But we were.

-x-

We were separated this time. I had no idea where in the maze of cells my teammates were locked up, and wasn't particularly sure where I was either. All I knew was that I was sitting in a small concrete cell. I was lucky—while it was large enough for me to lay down in, I doubt a full grown adult could have. There was a dull light from above, but it was impossible to reach it. The light gave off an annoying buzzing sound. A small pail of water stood in the corner.

They left me in there for four days. No one came by. No one brought more water, let alone food. All I had were my thoughts.

I couldn't help but think that they were trying to drive me crazy.

My bottom lip had been chewed raw, and my knees were bruised from how hard I tapped my fingers on them.

On the bright side, I wasn't naked. They did strip search me, but they _gernerously_ allowed me to keep my underwear and my T-shirt, but only after thoroughly inspecting them for... I didn't really know. Poison? Seals? Secret messages? Dooms day devices? But I wasn't naked, which was what mattered. At least Leaf ninja didn't strip a little girl and then lock her away when they're not using her, like fucking pedophiles.

And so when the fourth day came, and a large man dragged me to an interrogation room, I decided to call him "Not a Pedophile."

Not a Pedophile deposited me on a hard metal chair, and proceeded to shackle my ankles and wrists to it. Then he left.

It was a short wait for the interrogator to enter the room. He had long blond hair and the telltale eyes of the Yamanaka clan.

"Yamanaka-san." I greeted him, inclining my head. "Lovely to meet you."

He remained stoic. "State your name, age, registration number, and rank."

"Hoshino Sekai. Eight years old. Registration number zero one two five oh seven. Genin."

"Thank you, Hoshino." the man said. "Please close your eyes and hold still."

My fists clenched. That didn't sound good, but I closed them regardless.

-x-

I felt a strange jolt, which shook me into consciousness, and it was clear that I was no longer in the interrogation room.

Where ever I was, it was swallowed in darkness that seemed to stretch on endlessly. Spaced erratically around the darkness were shiny, bright orbs. Some appeared larger than others, with some as large as one of those exercise balls, and others were barely pinpricks. Perhaps the smaller ones were just far away? It was hard to judge distance. Occasionally, it looked like many of the orbs were flying by, leaving a trail of light behind them.

It took me a minute to realize that where ever I was, it was modelled on outer space. One thing stood out as odd though—a large, gated archway.

Was this some sort of genjutsu? Before I could try to dispel it, someone spoke.

 _Why can't I understand you? How is she aware...?_

A feeling of terror spread through out me, and several of the orbs seemed to shoot off into the darkness, like they were hiding. The flying orbs picked up speed and started to move erratically. I had no idea where I was, but instinctively I knew that voice _didn't belong_.

I tried to move into a defensive position, but quickly realized _I had no body_. Panic overwhelmed me, and the orbs started vibrating. In the midst of my panic, I felt something _relax_ , like there had been a threat present, but now it was gone.

I woke up.

-x-

"What the fuck was that?" I snarled, uncharacteristically enraged. I wasn't sure what happened, but the feeling of violation was stronger than any other feeling I'd ever had. ( _It was wrong. WRonG, w_ _ **r**_ _O_ n _g,_ _ **W**_ _r_ _ **oN**_ _G!)_

The Yamanaka stared at me blankly. He shook his head, and his slightly dazed expression reformed into careful neutrality.

The room was silent but for my rapid breathing.

"I'm not sure." he finally said.

"What the fuck do you mean you're not sure? You're the one who did it!" I growled between clenched teeth.

"Yes well. You... ah, responded to the jutsu atypically." His face remained neutral, but I could detect a hint of uncertainty in his expression.

"What. Fucking. Happened." I demanded again.

Instead of answering, the Yamanaka stood from the seat across from me, and I couldn't even remember when he sat down. He strode out of the room, and a heavy door slammed shut behind him.

Since he left me alone, I took a moment to compose myself.

I took a deep breath, and slowly let it out. Never had my anger, or _any_ emotion for that matter, been so strong that I reacted that way, and I couldn't understand why I did now.

I didn't yell or snarl at people—I would completely close off, I would disengage and give the cold shoulder. I would, as Aiko likes to say, _slay_ the person who made me angry with cold, harsh words.

Before I could ponder the matter more, the Yamanaka returned.

"Hoshino. You will be released shortly." he informed me. "Sensors have verified your chakra signature. Unfortunately the mind probe for mental tampering was inconclusive. You will be monitored for the next few weeks, to ensure you're not at risk."

My lips thinned. "Very well. But I repeat myself, what did you do to me?"

He sighed. "You were not supposed to be aware during the mind probe—you should have been unconscious."

"Continue." I prompted when it seemed he wasn't going to speak further.

"We were in the jutsu's manifestation of your mind. I was searching for thoughts, memories and feelings relating to being held prisoner and interrogated, which were the spheres.

"When I first entered, it was unusual not to see an avatar of yourself, but it didn't seem to be an issue. Then I touched one of the spheres, and while it contained thoughts, I could comprehend them no more than Aiko-chan could."

My eyes narrowed.

"Touching the sphere woke you, which shouldn't have been possible. I could not see you, you had no form, no avatar, but I felt you. Then I left. Is that satisfactory, Hoshino?"

-x-

After being released, Kushina-sensei ambushed me.

"Oh my god, Sekai!" Sensei wailed while clinging to me. "I'm so sorry I didn't come for you! They sent me out right after you left and I only got back to the village, like, a week ago! I had no idea before then!"

"It's..."I hesitated. It wasn't fine. _I_ wasn't fine. "Not your fault." I settled for as I awkwardly patted her back.

My red headed teacher sniffled. "Like, still! You shouldn't—that shouldn't have happened to you! I should have been there to protect you!"

"Kushina-sensei—"

She sobbed. "Oh! I didn't think I'd, like, ever hear you say that again!"

"Sensei, perhaps we should take this elsewhere..." I suggested, since the stares of the street's other occupants were starting to make me uncomfortable.

That seemed to snap sensei out of it, and she quickly whisked me away, to her home in the Senju district.

Once we arrived, she informed me that my apartment had been reclaimed while I was gone, but Minato-san had packed up my things and they were all stored in my room in the Uzumaki home.

"I don't think it was assigned to anyone else, yet, so, like, we'll try to get it back for you, but for now you're staying here, okay?" Kushina-sensei informed me. "And, like, you're staying here until I decide you're ready to live alone again."

"That's not necessary, Sensei," I tried to protest.

"It is. You've been gone a long time, and went through an extremely traumatizing experience." She argued firmly.

With a small sigh, I nodded. I wasn't going to be able to change her mind.

-x-

Team four was given one month leave. The leave served two purposes, a supposed "recovery" period, and time for the three of us to get back into shape.

Of course, a single month was hardly enough time to get over being held captive and tortured, but I doubt they expected it to be. I was of the opinion there was a third reason for the leave—to keep an eye on us and make sure we weren't a danger to the village. Not that I shared that belief with anyone.

It was strange to be back in the village. Constricting, almost. While the weeks in Earth were horrible, and the three weeks trying to get back home were terrifying, for those three weeks I had been _free_.

But it was best not to dwell on that.

Instead I tried to settle back in. Living with sensei wouldn't have been so bad, but The Nuisance drove me crazy. Though, when he first saw me and started crying, that was sort of sweet. Only sort of though. I ended up spending my evenings and weekends training or visiting Hanako in order to avoid him.

My first visit to Hanako after returning was... overwhelming, to say the least.

Like everyone else, she had thought me dead. I was prepared for that. What I wasn't prepared for was her _guilt_.

-x-

"We should keep them together." An aging man said. "They work well together—they each specialize, but even if they go on a specialized mission, the other two have skills that could be of use."

"Sure, but they don't need the other two for specialized missions—the team was never intended to last, but to give them experience working with others and so they could run C-ranks." A brunet argued. "It's a waste to send along the ones who aren't needed."

"If I may, gentleman," A Yamanaka interrupted. "I was the one who performed the mind probe on team four. From Aiko-chan, I'm familiar with their teamwork, and it's better than teams that have been together years. They cover each others' weaknesses, and have excellent non-verbal communication among themselves. From Haruno, I got similar results, albeit after much difficulty. As for Hoshino, I only found one thing—she is intensely loyal to team four, but not the village."

-x-

Notes: The Yamanaka and Satoi techniques are very different, so Sekai's experience with them is very different. Though both clans can "read minds" and the like, they have different ways of doing the same things.

The Yamanaka couldn't understand Sekai's thoughts or memories, but he could feel her emotions. He basically was searching for memories related to the event, and he was able to feel intense protectiveness and devotion towards Aiko and Sakura. He tried sensing for Leaf, but since he was searching for "konoha" nothing came up. However, when he focused on the symbol, he found her feelings about the village to be... apathetic, for want of a better word. This is how he determined her loyalty, even though loyalty isn't really a feeling.

This chapter was mostly written around the same time as the chapter before i. So if things are a bit off/redundant/whatever, that is why.

There are roughly two chapters left of this arc, and then we get another interlude, which will give us some background info.

Did anyone guess that Aiko had a bloodline limit? Or rather, the beginnings of one? I did hint at it. Using it requires eye contact, and it makes her eyes change, hence why she often averts her gaze. Her lenses are shiny and prescription-less, but the frame is the same colour as her eyes to draw attention from them. Back in chapter five, it was mentioned that she figured out who was loyal, but never stated how, as Sekai took her at her word. The family dynamics at Aiko's birthday party were also a hint. In other, related news, there is a pic I drew of her in the Naruto style on the Sekai-against-the-world tumblr.

I noticed some inconsistencies in earlier chapters. On AO3 I went back and edited them, as it was easy enough to do so there, but they remain in the fanfiction dot net version. Honestly, I'll probably tidy up the AO3 version every now and then, so if you want something with less mistakes, check over there. So far I've edited most of the chapters on AO3 and made minor changes, nothing story changing, but added in little details and rephrased things.


	17. Fifteen

Against the World

"Have you ever heard the phrase 'there are no psychiatrists'? Here, even after being tortured, there are no psychiatrists."

-x-

"What do you recommend, Yamanaka-san?"

The Yamanaka sighed and rubbed his eyes. "I should clarify that while it seems she has no real loyalty to the village specifically, we can't say anything for sure, as I was unable to make any sense of her mind, and thus unable to properly search through it for more details. Furthermore, our primary source has not indicated any feelings of malevolence towards the village on Hoshino's part.

"I recommend keeping her with her team, and monitoring her closely for any troubling behaviours. Both Aiko-chan and Haruno are loyal to the village, so I do not believe we need to worry as of yet. It is also within our interest to encourage the relationships she's developed with other loyal nin, such as Hatake-san and Uchiha Itachi-san."

The Hokage acknowledged his words with a nod. "I see. Thank you for your input, Yamanaka-san. While it would normally not be terribly concerning that the girl's loyalty is not tied to the village, with our intentions for her, we must remedy that. It's a shame she was so resistant to the academy's conditioning. Perhaps we should have left her there longer."

Yamanaka shook his head, his long hair swishing behind him. "Frankly, Hokage-sama, I doubt that would have helped. From what I could gather, her fondness for the village increased after graduation."

Dan hummed. "Is that so? Then perhaps we are not so worse off as I feared."

-x-

Fifteen

The day after I was released, I went to visit Hanako in the hospice. I signed in as usual and hurried down the familiar halls towards her room. I knocked gently on her door, and opened it when she gave permission.

She looked up from whatever she was working on, and froze. Her brown eyes widened and filled with tears. "S-Sekai-chan?" She whispered, and let out a chocked sob.

"Hanako-baa-san." I said in greeting, addressing her as she preferred. She closed her eyes, and her lips trembled. I walked over to her bedside, and she gestured for me to climb on the bed beside her, which I did without hesitation.

Her good arm wrapped around me, pulling me close to her, and she completely broke down sobbing. The position was awkward, but I did my best to return the hug. Her cries were equal parts pained and relieved, and soon she started speaking between them. Things like "I'm so glad you're okay" and "I thought I lost you" spilled from her lips, but nothing was so frequent as her apologies.

I didn't say anything, just let her hold me and stroke my uneven hair as she cried. When she finally started to calm, I decided to speak.

"The hair clips you gave me... I lost them. I'm sorry." I apologized.

Hanako let out what must have been a cross between laughing and crying, but sounded like something was dying. "It's okay, Sekai-chan. I have a few more pairs lying around. Though I guess you'll need to grow out your hair again before you can use them, hm?"

-x-

"Kushina-sensei, what happened to Kairi-sensei?" I asked over dinner later that day. Ever since I'd returned to the village, the question had been nagging at me, though a large part of me was afraid I didn't want to know.

Sensei's face blanked, and she closed her eyes. "What I know, is second hand or third hand," she started, opening her eyes, which seemed to lose their shine. "But from what I understand, after she sent you ahead while she dealt with the ninja who were approaching you, reinforcements came, and ultimately it turned into a full scale battle. Kairi-chan... she's not really a combat ninja, but she held off nearly two dozen chuunin and genin until ally reinforcements arrived, and the battle only got worse. She collapsed from severe chakra exhaustion, and at first those around had no idea that she had sent you guys ahead." Sensei bit her lip. "They brought her back to the village, when they got the chance, but..."

"But?" I prodded gently.

"She's in a coma. And we're not completely sure why."

-x-

I woke to a blow across the face, and a sore throat. Kushina-sensei was looming over me, hand raised.

"Wh-at?" I rasped, blinking. I looked around the room, and noticed Minato-san hovering nervously by the door, The Nuisance covered in snot and tears hiding behind him.

"You had a nightmare, Sekai-chan." Kushina-sensei murmured soothingly, sitting next to my on my bed and running a hand through my hair. "Are you okay? Do you want to talk about it?"

I shook my head stiffly. "I'm fine. I don't—I don't remember anything."

Sensei shot me a disbelieving look. "You screamed your throat raw, Sekai-chan."

I shrugged in response. What was there to say? I was telling the truth. If she hadn't woken me I probably wouldn't have noticed. I likely would have dismissed my sore throat in the morning as getting sick.

She sighed, and motioned towards the door. Minato-san gave me a smile and pulled his son away, closing the door behind them.

"Are you sure you don't want to talk about it?"

"I really don't remember, sensei."

She didn't believe me.

-x-

The room they kept her in was small, but there were still five others in the same room, separated by nothing but thin curtains.

Kairi-sensei lay on a small hospital bed, looking more fragile than I'd ever seen her. Her hair, which usually covered the right side of her face, was shaved off, revealing not only fresh, precise scars across her head, but also older ones covering the portion of her face she usually kept hidden.

They looked like scars from acid attacks.

She was missing an eye.

Did Aiko know that? Did Sakura?

Did it matter?

Why wasn't she waking up?

The scars on her head, the fresh ones, looked too neat to be from an attack. Brain surgery, perhaps.

Did they have that here?

Was something so wrong she required brain surgery? Did they mess up? Is that why she won't wake up?

Why wasn't she—

A hand shook my shoulder.

I blinked, and looked up, seeing Itachi-senpai eyeing me cautiously. I blinked again, and my surroundings snapped into place. I was no longer in the hospital, but in the training ground where we met for genjutsu lessons.

How did that happen?

"Itachi-senpai?"

"Sekai-kun?" he asked gently. "Are you alright?"

At a loss, I shrugged. He sighed in response, and lowered himself to the ground, gesturing for me to sit beside him. For what seemed like hours, but could have been just a moment, we sat together in silence.

"I thought you were dead," he commented casually, as if discussing the weather.

"I'm not."

"Clearly. How are you?"

I exhaled forcibly through my nose. "Why does everyone keep asking me that?"

Itachi-senpai gave me a look. "Perhaps because you were held captive for weeks and tortured. Or maybe because you look like you haven't been sleeping. It could also be that you wandered into the training ground and didn't respond when I called your name."

"Then you clearly know the answer." I grumbled.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked.

I glared at him. "No, I do not want to discuss how I was held captive and tortured for weeks, thanks for asking."

Itachi-senpai shook his head. "Apologies, that was phrased wrong. I meant about what just happened—how you seemed not to notice me or your surroundings."

"I don't know." I admitted. "I... I was visiting Kairi-sensei. And then I was here."

Senpai stood, and held out a hand in front of me. "Let's go somewhere a bit more comfortable, alright?" Ignoring how that could be taken as a come on, I grabbed his hand and let him pull me to my feet.

His grip on my hand was immediately replaced with a grip on my shoulder, and he led me through the streets of the Uchiha district, until we reached what must have been his home.

"Mother, can you set an extra place for dinner tonight?" he called as he stepped inside.

"Is Shisui joining us again?" a woman, presumably his mother, replied from the other room. "I thought he was still out on a mission?"

I slipped on the oversized guest slippers, and followed Itachi as he walked though the entry into the kitchen, where I saw a beautiful woman with blue hair so dark it was nearly black.

"Not exactly. Mother, I don't believe you've met Sekai-kun?"

"I don't believe so. You must be Kushina-chan's student, yes?" The woman smiled at me. It was warm and soft, and reminded me of my own mother.

"Yes. It's a pleasure to meet you, Uchiha-san."

"Ah, please call me Mikoto-san." She requested with a smile. She glanced towards my feet and frowned. "Oh dear, those simply won't do. Let me find a pair of Sasuke's old slippers for you, okay, Sekai-chan?"

"Ah, that's... you don't have to do that Mikoto-san. I don't wish to trouble you." I protested.

"It's no trouble!" she assured me and bustled out of the kitchen.

"Sekai-kun and I will be in my room, mother."

"Alright, dears!"

-x-

"They thought we had something, a... a key to their code, or whatever. We didn't, but we also knew if they knew that, they'd just kill us. So we pretended we did." I began.

The whole story came pouring out as I sat on Itachi-senpai's bed, clutching a pillow, while he was seated on the chair by his desk across the room.

I told him the basics of our plan and how we escaped. I told him what they did to us, to me.

"I had it the worst," I admitted. "They needed me specifically. I'm—we were just lucky that they didn't kill Aiko or Sakura. Because I was the one who has the information. I mean, we made them think that." My words were clumsy, coming out quickly, as I just wanted to get it out already. I was in a hurry because I wanted this to be over, I didn't want to talk about it anymore. Except I did. I wanted to tell someone. I needed to.

So I told senpai how they stripped us, how they kept ripping out my nails and regrowing them, how they beat me. I told him about how they loved electrocuting me, and showed him the fading Lichtenberg lines scarring my skin. I told him how I hated those days, but I preferred them to the waterboarding.

"I kept reciting the Fibonacci sequence, over and over, to myself whenever... whenever. It was easy enough up until about the twentieth term, then things got harder to keep track of. It calmed me. I don't think I'd have made it through without it."

By the time I'd finished, I was crying. The older ninja looked horrified. I couldn't say if it was at what had happened to me, or at the fact that I was crying.

He walked over to his bed and sat on the opposite end, opening his arm awkwardly. I bit my lip, and scooted over, burying my face in his side, and let him hold me.

-x-

Dinner was a traditional affair. I was seated next to Itachi at the low table, who was seated to the right of his father at the head.

Despite the traditional set up, it was a warm affair. Itachi-senpai's younger brother rambled about his day at the academy, his mother asked questions, and the clan head, Fugaku-sama, and senpai smiled slightly, but indulgently.

Mikoto-san and Fugaku-sama carefully kept Sasuke's focus off of me, deflecting any questions he had for me. Aside from a murmured blessing at the beginning of the meal, I didn't speak. I'd used up all the words I had for the day.

After dinner was over, Itachi-senpai walked me back to sensei's house, where I promptly excused myself and went to my room. Nearly three quarters of an hour later, I heard the door close, and Itachi-senpai leave.

-x-

The next morning I lingered in bed. I woke up early enough, but I was exhausted from the previous day, despite sleeping through the night. I tossed and turned, but didn't get out of bed until I could no longer ignore my bladder.

When I opened the door to exit the bathroom, Kushina-sensei was standing outside of it.

"Come on." She said, gently grabbing my hand. She led me up the stairs to the fourth floor. I hadn't been up here much, but I knew Minato's office was up there, and Kushina's was too. Or at least, I'd thought it was an office until she opened the door.

The room had large windows covered with flowing curtains, which sensei pushed aside, letting in natural light. The rest of the walls are covered with dozens of paintings and drawings of various mediums. There was a large desk in the corner, covered with pencils and charcoal. Several easels were spread out over the room, holding oil paintings in various stages of completion.

Sensei dragged me into the room, and pushed me into a chair before pulling up another one. "The life of a ninja is hard. Sometimes people you care about are hurt, and sometimes you are. And as you move up the ranks, it only gets worse. Some people break. Others find ways to cope. This," her arm swooped out, gesturing to the room. "This is how I cope. I create. I channel my feelings into something productive. I thought you might like to try. If you want, you can use anything here."

I bit my lip, and nodded. I wasn't sure if it would help, but I was interested. Back in The Before, I had dabbled a bit in art. I wasn't amazing or anything, but I was better than average. Supplies were expensive though, even basic paper, due to the war driving prices up, so I hadn't bothered with art in this life. There was too much to do, besides. But maybe it would help.

Under Kushina-sensei's encouraging gaze, I wandered around the room, opening drawers and cupboards, taking stock of what she had. Finally, I grabbed a loose stack of paper, some pencils of various hardness and an eraser, deciding it was best to start with the basics. I wandered over to one the desks, absently pulling my chair over, and tried to decide what to draw.

I stared at the paper blankly for what seemed like ages, gripping a 2H pencil in my hand. Finally, I began to draw.

I started out sketching vague outlines, then adding detail, but it was hard. In The Before, if I was trying to draw something specific, I often used reference photos, but that wasn't an option, so I was drawing from memory. I crumpled up more papers than I could count, unhappy with each sketch. The images in my mind's eye were faded, but I did my best, and even used my reflection for reference.

By the end of the day, I had a sketch that reasonably resembled mother.

The next day I returned to the art room and transferred the sketch to canvas. I scuttled around the room, searching for any acrylic paints, but found only watercolours and oils, so I decided to try painting with the latter.

I'd never tried oils in The Before, so it was a new experience, and I messed up and had to restart a lot over the next few days. Once sensei caught me with the oils, she showed me a simple jutsu to make the paints dry faster, went over some safety precautions I hadn't initially known about and showed me a handful of techniques and tips, like painting thin to thick, how to mix paint, some different ways to blend, and effects you could get with a pallet knife and different sorts of paintbrushes.

It was a lot of fun, and I felt closer to Kushina-sensei than I ever had before. It felt like she was sharing a piece of herself with me.

-x-

I was half done my eleventh attempt at painting mother when I felt a wet sensation on my ankle. Squeaking, I leapt to my feet and looked down, only to find Pakkun.

"Ah, Pakkun-chan. What are you doing here?" I asked as I bent down to pet him.

"Kakashi wants to know how you're doing. It's been two weeks since you got back and he's worried."

"Why hasn't he come over and asked me himself then?" Kakashi-senpai had a standing invitation to dinner whenever he was in the village, and since he was still on medical leave, he had every chance to come over, but hadn't.

Pakkun shifted, and I was pretty sure it was supposed to be a shrug. "He wasn't sure if you were comfortable seeing him."

My eyes narrowed in confusion. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"We don't know what happened to you while you were... away. He doesn't want to intrude." Pakkun explained patiently.

"So why send you?"

"He knows how much you liked us dogs. Kakashi figured that you would be okay with seeing one of us, at least, and I could pass on the message."

Reading between the lines, my heart melted. Kakashi-senpai was worried about me, but was concerned that I'd been sexually assaulted and would be uncomfortable around men, so he stayed away to give me space. It was so sweet of him.

"I'd like to see him, if that's okay."

Pakkun nodded, and jumped up to my shoulder, then climbed onto my head. After cleaning up my work area, I slipped on my shoes and headed to Kakashi-senpai's apartment.

I was going to knock on the door, but Pakkun told me to just go right in, so I did. "You lived here for a couple months, after all," he said, and jumped down.

Kakashi-senpai was sitting on the couch reading a familiar orange book. He looked up when the door opened, and quickly stashed the book away, rising to his feet. "Sekai-chan, it's good to see you again." His arms rose a bit, but quickly fell back to his sides, like he was about to reach out for me but thought better of it.

Hoping I was reading him right, I strode over and wrapped my arms around his middle. "Good to see you too, senpai."

Gently, he wrapped an arm around me, and used the other to pat my head. "I was worried."

Pulling back, I looked up at him. "Thank you. For being considerate." I paused awkwardly for a moment, unsure of how to say that his worries had been for nothing. "I'm okay though. You... didn't need to stay away."

My former roommate eye-smiled, and ruffled my hair.

-x-

While art did actually help me cope, it wasn't the only thing to help. After a the kick start it gave me, I fell back on my first love, math.

Sadly, I was (temporarily, they assured me) banned from the D archives, but I had enough content copied to keep myself busy, especially once I pulled out the math texts I'd liberated for myself back in November.

One was an algebra text, which covered groups, rings, and fields. It was good review of topics I'd learned back in Algebra I and II. It turned out I'd forgotten a lot, especially since I'd been focusing on calculus and analysis in this life. The other two were combinatorics texts, which ew, but I was sort of desperate. (Combinatorics really wasn't my thing, aside from the glorious, simplistic beauty of the pigeon hole principle. And I suppose the Birthday Paradox, which wasn't really a paradox, was pretty cool too.)

A lot of algebra proofs, especially things I learned in Algebra I, were very straightforward and relaxing, such as proving all cyclic groups of order n were isomorphic to Z mod n.

The combinatorics work I did though, was frustrating and infuriating because I was making myself do it even though _I just didn't give a flying fuck how many ways you could do this or that or about generating functions or WHATEVER,_ but it was a good distraction late at night when I couldn't sleep. Minato-san and Kushina-sensei were subjected to more than a few rants about how much I hated the subject when they felt the need to check in on me at three in the morning.

So between speaking to Itachi and Kakashi, taking up art, and studying math, by the end of the month off I was given, I was... not great, or even okay, but I was getting there.

And the fact that the mandatory leave ending meant I could see my team again? That was the biggest relief.

-x-

Our first day of training after returning was in early July. We were set to meet at seven in the morning, but all three of us arrived closer to five.

Words were unnecessary for those first two hours, waiting for our sensei to arrive. We just sat huddled together, basking in the closeness.

The logic behind keeping us apart for the past month had something to do with preventing us from becoming codependent, preventing us from collaborating if we'd been compromised, and some other bullshit reasoning I didn't particularly pay attention to. If sensei hadn't assured me it was standard protocol, and gave some examples of how things went wrong before they'd started doing that, I probably would have mutinied.

When seven o'clock rolled around, a woman I hadn't seen before approached us. She had brown hair, green eyes, and wore light makeup. She was relatively petite, and reminded me of a doll. An overall average appearance. She looked less like a ninja and more like a civilian, except for the way she moved, gracefully and without a sound. "Good morning, girls. I am Maki Asami. I have already met Aiko-chan, but I am pleased to meet the rest of the team as well."

"Why are you here?" I demanded bluntly, though I had a feeling I knew why. One that she confirmed the next time she spoke.

"I am filling in for Kojima-san until she is able to return to her duties."

"So she's expected to recover?" Sakura interjected, worrying her lip between her teeth. I was a bit surprised that she didn't already know, but upon thinking about it I realized despite her status as a medic, they probably wouldn't have told her anything while we were on mandatory leave.

"We're optimistic." she replied diplomatically. "Now, I'm aware that this is your first time seeing each other after being held captive in Earth Country. During the past month, many decisions have been made regarding your team."

"Like what?" Sakura asked, continuing to nibble on her lip. The way she kept biting it convinced me that if she weren't able to heal herself, it would be scabbed over and raw.

"Like the fact that the three of you will remain as a team permanently." The brunette smiled kindly.

My lips thinned and eyes narrowed. Aiko, who's gaze had been on her ragged nails, snapped her head up to look at her temporary mentor. "You mean we weren't before?"

"No. Previously, it was intended that you would be placed together only to learn to work with others and complete missions. Eventually, you would have been seperated. However after reviewing recent events and your history together, it was decided that the three of you have a great deal of potential as a team, and it would be in the village's best interest to keep you together." The three of us relaxed, and the woman, who I mentally dubbed Dollface, paused for a moment. "This requires some changes in the way you three will be trained, starting today. Aiko-chan has underwent much of this training in the past, to prepare her for future missions that we initially did not intend to send the two of you on, Sakura-chan, Sekai-chan. That has changed, now, so you must learn, as Aiko-chan has, the art of infiltration."

-x-

What followed was like the girls-only classes of the academy on steroids.

In the academy, we had learned the basics of applying makeup and disguising ourselves, but what Dollface taught us went far beyond anything we learned there. She showed us how to contour with makeup to alter our features without the use of ninjutsu, how to emphasize certain features and distract from others. We learned how to use common objects combined with E-rank fire ninjutsu to approximate a curling iron and straightener. She taught us how to extract pigments from various flora to create dyes, and which were temporary or permanent.

Once she deemed our efforts satisfactory "for now," she moved onto acting lessons.

She made us practice walking over and over. A person's gait, the way they walked, was distinctive, and she called out orders to stand straighter, take shorter steps, to sway our hips more, to loosen our shoulders. She poked and prodded at us, physically adjusting us when we didn't move the way she wanted us to. I hated it, the way she just placed her hands all over us, but it was incentive to do it right.

We each were given a set of gaits to practice, and we would be expected to fall into them at a moment's notice.

For each gait, she slowly developed a persona we were to slip into.

It started with pitching our voices a different way, and then changing the cadence of our speech.

Each persona had preferences. Some liked tea, others preferred coffee. We had to keep likes and dislikes straight. Prejudices, mannerisms. She tested us on it daily. Soon, we learned to become different people.

The process took months, and Dollface was especially displeased with me. While I had an excellent poker face, my lack of expression was a hindrance in all of this. She spent hours with me, forcing me to copy expressions. They were stiff and plastic at first, and her fingers pulled and pinched at my face, constantly rearranging it.

My hatred for her touch spurned me on until she deemed me passable, but decided to keep my roles as shy and reserved as possible.

"You were never pegged for infiltration work," Dollface told me. "In fact, it was specifically recommended that you're kept away from it. But circumstances must, and I will not let you shame me by performing poorly, understood?"

She was an exacting, merciless mistress, and once she declared us fit, all I could feel was relief.

-x-

I almost wished to return to the infiltration lessons, however, when I discovered what we'd be doing next.

Interrogation.

It was a good thing that shortly after I returned to active duty, I was able to move back into the dorms. By luck, I even got my old one back, as it hadn't be reassigned yet.

The dorms had excellent sound proofing, and so whenever I woke with a sore throat from screaming myself raw, no one heard.

It got easier though, and I came to realize that the interrogation lessons were being used to desensitize us to our trauma.

The three of us learned to work an interrogation as a team.

Aiko did soft interrogations, mostly. She would ask questions, and even if they didn't answer, they frequently thought it. When they did speak, she could tell when they were lying. It was fascinating to see her in her element, and horrifying as well. She could lead a conversation exactly where she wanted it, and the subject didn't even realize they were being lead to think about specific things, or that they were giving anything up.

Sakura, too, took surprisingly well to interrogations. Unlike Aiko, she got physical. With her medical knowledge, she knew precisely how to inflict minimum damage while causing maximum pain. She was capable of pushing the limits of how much damage she could inflict beyond what your average interrogator could, since she could heal them right up before it got life threatening. Furthermore, she was an expert at causing permanent, career ending injuries. It was almost surprising how many people crumbled at the thought of never being able to be a ninja again.

As for myself... I was also taught physical torture, we all were. But what I learned to do was play with their heads. Genjutsu was a powerful interrogation technique, but few beyond the Uchiha clan, who were best served elsewhere, were capable of the subtle touch necessary for it to be the most effective. It was best, after all, if the subject had no idea they were under a genjutsu. No, it was best they believed they were hallucinating, going crazy. They had me amp up feelings of paranoia and panic. I made their skin crawl. They heard things, saw things. I stuck them in loops, making them think the interrogation had already happened, over and over until they couldn't tell when the real one started. I played on their fears. I broke people.

It was hard not putting myself in their place. There were times one of the three of us had to stop, being overwhelmed by flashbacks. But we learned to cover each other, and the more we did it the less it happened.

A dark part of me wondered if this was the village's sick form of therapy for us, but I dismissed it.

I doubted they cared enough to do even that.

-x-

In November, Team 4 was summoned to the Hokage tower. Not just Aiko, Sakura, and me, but all there of our mentors as well.

Neither of the older girls had any idea why we were summoned—this sort of summon wasn't common, but Kushina-sensei, Tsunade-sensei, and Dollface all seemed to know what was going on.

The six of us were led to the Hokage's office, a room that I'd never actually been in before. While it wasn't a restricted area like most of the tower, genin rarely had reason to meet with the Hokage.

His office was at the top of the tower, and was a large, circular room. It was mostly empty, save for a large desk and chair set in front of windows with a view of the mountain. Above the windows, were four portaits, one of each Hokage. The desk itself was covered with scrolls and papers, and a nondescript man stood beside the desk with a filing cart. Sitting behind the desk, was Kato Dan, garbed in the traditional robes.

"Welcome. I'm sure the three of you are wondering why you have been summoned here." He began with a kind smile that instincts honed over months of interrogations told me was false. "First of all, I would like to thank the three of you for your service to the village. Despite your age and rank, you performed better than the village could ever have expected while in enemy hands, and even managed to eliminate a major military base deep within Earth Country. Our reports in the following months show that this move has crippled the Satoi clan, as they lost the clan head and several other members. Shortly after your return, it was decided that these actions merit a promotion. In the past few months we have been preparing the three of you, and ensuring that your time in captivity will not hinder you in your new role. Congratulations, Team 4. You are now proud chuunin of the Village Hidden in Leaves."

I felt sensei give my shoulder a proud squeeze. "Thank you, Hokage-sama." Sakura spoke up for us. "We are truly honoured that you have seen to our promotions personally." She bowed, and Aiko and I followed her example.

"It was my pleasure," The man replied. "Now, I believe my assistant has some papers for the three of you to fill out and file. You are dismissed."

We gave a final bow, but he was no longer paying us any mind, instead focusing on the documents on his desk.

-x-

Notes: I accidentally deleted the sekai-against-the-world-tumblr. Oops. I'm posting image things there, but everything else is being moved to AO3, under a fic in the series titled "Against the World: Databook." It also has some new content/notes that weren't previously on the tumblr, so check that out. In other news, I have finished plotting up to chapter 25, but depending on things the events may stretch out a bit further, as is prone to happening. Currently, this is the end of arc 2, and I'm thinking arc 3 will end about there.

From my plans so far, arc 3 is action packed, and arc 4 will continue in that vein, methinks. How many arcs will there be? No idea. So far I have arc 3 planned in detail, arc 4 roughly outlined, and arc 5 vaguely outlined, with plans for their to be a 6th arc as well. There will be an interlude in between each. Question: What do you want to see in the third interlude? And would you be interested in more frequent interludes?

Also, yay I found another timeline mistake I made. I decided that they graduated in april of the year 72, and Aiko was born sept 61. Then I said she turned 12 in October 72. Likely because I decided when her birthday was after I decided the year, and wanted her to be 11 when she graduated. Like the same fucking thing I did with Sekai. Oops. I fixed it in the A03 version. I think. Might have missed a spot. The benefits of going over the fic and creating a month by month timeline!

I think I mentioned that I'd decided on ships for the fic, however plotting things out, they won't be happening until arc 4. I don't plan to tag them until they are relevant, however. That said, Sekai's ship will be plot relevant, so it's not up for debate at this point. How it ends, on the other hand, is. (i.e. is it endgame? I don't know yet.) At least one of the other ships is purely self indulgent, but barring difficulty writing it, it's fixed, as it is my OTP. I will promise though that romance isn't going to be the focus of this fic. If you really want to know, I may respond privately if you ask. In related news, I have closed the poll on my fanfiction dot net profile.

I went into a bit more detail about what, exactly, happened to Sekai while she was held captive, which was purposely glossed over before.

No, Sekai is not okay, thank you for asking.

You now know what happened to Kairi. Will she recover...? Who knows.

Thank you all for your kind comments/reviews, and all the kudos, favourites and follows/subscriptions. Again, please forgive mistakes and typos. I wrote about 3K of this from two a.m. on.

All the best,

The Mathemagician


	18. 2i

Against the World

"The clan precedes the individual. Or so they say."

-x-

Being the first of a line to develop a bloodline isn't all it's made out to be. There's so much pressure and so little choice.

-x-

2i

(Two Times the Square Root of Negative One)

Yamanaka Hikari and Yamanaka Inoshi didn't know just how special their little girl was at first. They loved her dearly of course, but it took time before they noticed that her eyes seemed a bit strange, even for a Yamanaka. They didn't think much of it, at first. Certainly, her blue pupils seemed to grow and shrink sometimes, beyond the norm, but it wasn't so obvious they did so when she was young.

But as she aged, they noticed her pupils would shrink more and more, becoming just pinpricks of blue on black. So they kept her home, away from others, until they understood what was happening with their daughter's eyes.

But then she began speaking, and they found she _knew_ things they'd never told her. She would respond to things they hadn't said aloud.

Hikari and Inoshi were ecstatic. Their little girl clearly had a doujutsu! She could read minds!

So they tested her, and the limits of her ability, which they hoped would only grow with Aiko.

And then, when she was four years old, they presented her to the head of their clan.

-x-

Yamanaka Inoshi wasn't always resentful of his older brother. They used to be quite close, in fact.

Unlike some clans, where the firstborn inherits the clan headship regardless of aptitude, if the head had more than one child, the Yamanaka clan chose the one they thought was best suited to leading.

And that was Inoshi.

That was Inoshi, until he wasn't.

That was Inoshi, until he burnt out his chakra coils, and it was decided that a cripple couldn't lead the clan.

His older brother didn't even have the grace to pretend he was sorry to become the heir. Inoichi was _happy_. He'd always envied his little brother, he'd always wanted to lead the clan, even though he was already busy with his position as head of intel, which he'd only been chosen for because he'd been passed over for the title of heir.

But now Inoichi was able to have his cake and eat it too.

Inoshi couldn't help but feel his brother was _happy_ that he was now a cripple, and he hated him for that. He hated his brother, because it was _his fault_ Inoshi was like this.

There was little Inoshi regretted more than saving his brother's life.

So to discover that his daughter ( _who was denied the right to the name Inoko, as she was not of the main family_ ) had manifested a doujutsu—the first in their clan to display the beginnings of a bloodline limit, it was sweet, sweet victory. It was vindication. _See?_ It said, _they chose wrong._

-x-

It was a topic of debate for years, and even after Aiko became a ninja, the topic was not settled, and it would not be for years to come.

Should Aiko replace Ino as the heiress of the clan?

Aiko's blood tie to the main family was just as close as Ino's, and only her grandfather's choice in heir distanced her from the title of heiress, and even then, if it weren't for her father's unfortunate circumstances, she _would_ have been the heiress. Furthermore, barring Inoichi siring another child, she was second in line, should anything happen to Ino.

And of course, surely the leading family should be those with the bloodline limit, at least until it spread throughout the clan.

But the head fought against the replacement of his heiress. There was no guarantee, he argued, that the ability would be passed on to Aiko's children. And if it wasn't, then they had messed with the succession, depriving his daughter of her birthright, for nothing. For a genetic fluke.

Inoishi, with the support of many clan elders, continued to argue in favour of his daughter. Even if it doesn't appear in Aiko's children, it's possible to appear further down the line, and isn't it best to keep that potential in the main family as much as possible?

The argument would rage circularly for years, and eventually be put to the side while they decided instead to focus on improving the chances of passing the trait on. Inoichi wasn't stepping down any time soon, and his job kept him in village. There was time.

-x-

Yamanaka Aiko hated her bloodline limit. She hated being unable to look people in the eye without knowing their thoughts. She hated that she was not granted the ignorance everyone else was, that she knew what people were thinking. She hated the pressure they put on her. She hated the lack of freedom, the lack of _choice_.

By the time she was ten, the clan elders already sought to find her a suitable husband among her clansmen. By the time she was eleven they had narrowed it down to a handful of individuals, all of whom were at least ten years her senior.

Aiko did not want a husband.

The men the selected were optimal matches for passing on her doujutsu to her future children, based on genetic testing and analysis of herself.

Aiko did not want children.

Her parents and most of the elders were pushing for her to be named heiress, so that one day she would lead the clan.

Aiko did not want to lead the clan.

But she had a bloodline limit, so what she wanted did not matter.

-x-

When Hikari married Inoshi, she'd believed that she was marrying the future head of the clan.

Their union was not a love match, and she had little say in the matter. Her parents had pledged her to the heir, hoping to elevate their status within the clan, the head accepted, and so neither she nor her husband could protest.

It felt like it was for nothing when her husband was replaced as heir. Were she not already pregnant when it happened, she would have petitioned the elders for an annulment.

But the moment she held her daughter in her arms, she knew she couldn't regret it. Her daughter deserved the world. So when Hikari discovered her precious Aiko was the first Yamanaka to develop a bloodline, she knew it was fate. Her daughter deserved the world, and with this, she could have it.

-x-

The question was, what else could this new Yamanaka doujutsu do?

While reading surface thoughts was certainly useful, it was far from the abilities of the village's other doujutsu.

It would be years before the village had their answer, years before Yamanaka Aiko reached her full potential. _But oh, how great she would become._

Her eyes may not have the combat prowess of the sharingan, or the insight of the byakugan, but they would be just as dangerous.

-x-

Notes: A bit of insight into the Yamanaka clan. I hope this explains the behaviour of Aiko's parents, Inoichi, and Ino back at Aiko's birthday.

Because, you know, the Uchiha and Hyuuga aren't the only fucked up clans. They aren't the only ones with drama.

And yes, there will be more to Aiko's doujutsu than mind reading.

In other news, I forgot to mention it last chapter but I have fanart! Two pieces by the lovely anja-nuehm over on tumblr! They can be found in the databook on AO3. All my love to this amazing, talented artist!


	19. Sixteen

Against the World

"There is little to do but move forward."

-x-

"She's abnormally small for her age." Tsunade commented to the Hokage. "I'm not sure why—in my initial assessment I predicted she would be on the small side, but she's barely growing. It is, quite frankly, worrying."

Dan frowned, but didn't look up from his paper work. "How so?"

Tsunade rolled her eyes, and launched into a long winded explanation.

The Hokage let her monologue for a few minutes, then sighed and cut her off. "What do you want me to do about it?"

"Let me be the one to go to the next meeting with Orochimaru, so I can discuss it with him, and have him do some testing."

"On the girl?!" Dan looked up, eyes wide with alarm.

Tsunade scowled. "Of course not, idiot. I'll give him a few samples and her file."

"I suppose that's acceptable. Very well then. Request approved."

-x-

Sixteen

It was a small affair. There was no wake or funeral proper. Hanako knew so few people there was little point.

It was fortunate I was in village when it happened, and I was notified right away. With permission from sensei, I dropped what I was doing and headed directly to the hospice. They allowed me to sit with her body, and take the time to wash it. Once she was clean, I dressed her in a white robe, since a kimono was not an option, and brushed out her thin silver hair.

Then I took out a scroll and ink, and sealed her away.

When I arrived at the crematorium I was surprised to find Tominaga Junichi, the clan head and Hanako's younger brother, standing outside.

"What right do you have to be here?" I demanded. "She was done with your family. You weren't there for her in life, why should I let you be here in death?"

"I did what I could, and she wasn't as done with us as you think." he replied calmly.

My eyes narrowed and my lips thinned. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It's none of your concern." The aging man pursed his lips, and shook his head. "I loved her, allow me this." he begged.

Reluctantly, I nodded.

The way things worked here, is that this crematorium was specifically for ninja, and was basically a DIY sort of place. We checked in at the reception and were sent to one of the chambers. I unsealed Hanako's body and placed her on the slab.

"Thank you for taking care of her." Tominaga said, idly stroking her silver hair. "Even coming here for this is a risk. If the elders knew..."

"Aren't you the clan head?" I asked curiously. "What could they do to you?"

He ignored my question and asked his own instead. "Will you allow me to be the one to burn the body?"

I nodded. If he hadn't come I would have had to use a seal, as I didn't have the skill with fire ninjutsu do to a proper burning.

And so, he set her ablaze.

I stood and watched, transfixed, until all that remained were ashes and bone.

I unsealed a simple urn from my arm. I'd picked it out nearly a year ago, when I noticed how poorly Hanako was fairing. I'd been carrying it around since, waiting for this day to come. It took longer than I'd been expecting. The past few months, whenever I visited her, she was no longer working on anything like she used to. She couldn't. She barely had the energy for speaking.

I took the chopsticks that had been provided, and slowly started moving the bones over to the urn, starting with the feet. Tominaga joined me, and we worked silently in tandem.

Soon, all that remained of Hanako was inside the urn.

Tominaga told me go ahead to the graveyard while he took care of the fees, and he would meet me at the plot she would share with her daughter.

He never made it.

-x-

The days after Hanako died were hazy. I felt alone in a way I hadn't before. Hanako may not have been a blood relative, but she was still family. She had been there for me my entire life. She was my last connection to my mother, the last person who'd known her.

And now she was gone too.

It was hard, and while my team and friends tried to be there for me, I just wanted to be alone.

In the years since I'd started wondering about my parentage, I'd let my research lapse. I'd hit a dead end, and then just never got back into it.

But now that everyone else was gone, it brought back the desire to figure out who my father was. So I pulled out my old notebook, and re-familiarized myself with the deductions and inferences I'd made back in the day.

With more knowledge of the system, there were a couple things I crossed out and added, but my analysis still seemed fairly accurate.

With the parameters of my search in mind, I headed over to the C archives.

I'd been granted access to them shortly after my promotion, and while they were in a different location than the D archives, they were pretty similar. They were deep underground, the entrance of which was in a residential building of an identical nature. The security was nearly the same, only tighter.

In the past I'd compared the D archives to a science library. The C archives were different. In set up, they reminded me a bit of what I'd heard about libraries prior to computers. Where things like newspapers and article clippings were stored in filing cabinets, and you had to manually search for things, instead of just googling information or looking up the location of a pertinent article or text in the system.

The archive was comprised of old, declassified personnel files and mission reports, maps and detailed geography books, both foreign and local, old bingo books, and other semi-sensitive documents.

Unlike the D archives, which were full of towering shelves packed full of scrolls and books, this place was filled with filing cabinets, with the occasional bookshelf scattered here or there. It was emptier, too, except for the geography section.

I wandered around, looking through old files, trying to suss out how they'd organized things here.

I found the names and pictures of both former and current department heads, and slowly made my way through them, marking out a handful of men who met the parameters of my search, and then moved onto the old bingo books. They were all at least a decade old, but I figured it was still possible to find something, and I added a few more names to my mental list of potential fathers.

I probably would have kept going, kept obsessively searching, but Team 4 was assigned a mission.

-x-

After our promotion to chuunin, we were rarely accompanied by any of our teachers on missions, and while we had yet to be sent out specifically for fighting, the missions we got were of higher importance and increased danger.

Our current mission was a B-rank escort mission. Leaf had a trading deal with miners up north in Mountain Country, which was located between Pond and Rice Fields. Our mission was to guard the small mining caravan, composed of perhaps a dozen people, as they returned home.

Fortunately, as they had come here for a delivery, their carts were mostly empty, and only contained supplies required for the journey, making our jobs easier.

A straight line from their town to Leaf was approximately 900 km, and since we were stuck travelling on the main roads, that added another 200 km or so to the journey. Furthermore, we would be travelling as fast as the miners' team of oxen could pull their carts. On the bright side, the oxen in this world were larger, stronger, and faster than the oxen of The Before. I assumed it was something to do with chakra, as most such differences are. I vaguely recalled reading in The Before that an ox could travel at a speed of roughly 3 km per hour, but the ones here could push 10.

Doing some quick math, I estimated it would take us between ten days and two weeks to reach the miners' village, and then two days to make it back. Perhaps one day if we pushed ourselves, and three if we took our time.

We were hardly going to dawdle, though. Currently, most of the fighting was over in Meadow Country and near Lightning, but we would be crossing through an area that saw heavy traffic between Earth and Lightning, which meant we were likely to be attacked once we crossed the border out of Fire.

Delays due to weather had to be considered too. It was February, and while the weather in Leaf rarely dipped below freezing, it would get colder as we headed north into the mountains.

I kept this all in mind as I prepared for the mission. I pulled on my mesh under armour, and then a thick long sleeved shirt and matching pants over top of it. I slipped my black and purple chest guard over top, and pulled on a pair of tall boots. Finally, I took out a blue pin and attached it to my forehead protector, right beside the plate.

The blue pin indicated my rank, and all chuunin and higher ranked ninja had to wear them when they left the village. Blue was for chuunin, purple for special jounin, and red for elite jounin. The idea was to recognize rank when dealing with unfamiliar but allied ninja.

Rank impersonation was a serious crime, of course. I'd actually been accused of it twice, however I wasn't actually guilty so beyond Kushina-sensei teasing and laughing at me, it didn't have much impact. Well, for me, at least. I hear the ninja who reported me got in trouble for insubordination when it came out that I held rank over them and they refused to listen to me.

I met Sakura and Aiko on the way to the north-east gate. Sakura was wearing her typical short sleeved qipao dress, however it was layered over a black, long sleeved shirt. She'd traded out her usual shorts for pants, and her sandals for boots. Aiko on the other hand had taken to wearing the standard navy sweater and pants that made up the official uniform of Leaf ninja. At thirteen, she had started to develop curves, and she hated them, so she did her best to hide it behind loose clothing. Both of them wore the standard beige travelling cloaks, which I had opted to leave sealed in my arm.

At the gate, we met the miners. Doing a quick survey, I counted thirteen of them, ten wagons, with five pairs of oxen. Two oxen each were hooked up to five of the wagons. Each of those five wagons had another attached to it from behind.

Sakura, who over time was elected our "people person," greeted them. "Hello. We are Team 4. My name is Sakura, and these are my teammates, Aiko and Sekai. We are the team of chuunin sent to escort you back home to your village in Mountain."

A large, sturdy man frowned, but greeted her in return. After a brief discussion, we left.

Aiko took the front of the caravan, Sakura took the rear, and I took the side. Ideally we'd have a fourth person for the other side, but there was nothing we could do about that.

We travelled mostly in silence along the roads. It had snowed recently, and though it melted quickly, it left the roads damp and muddy. More than once Sakura had to use her enhanced strength when one of the wagons got stuck.

It was boring, but we couldn't afford any distractions, especially on the fourth day when we neared the borders.

We had two options, we could pass through the Mountain capital, or we could cross over into Rice Fields briefly, which was a slightly shorter path, but the roads were worse. Sakura said Tsunade-sensei told her that Rice Fields would always be a safer bet for us, but not why, so trusting her mentor, we opted to go that way.

True to Tsunade-sensei's word, we passed through Rice Fields unmolested.

On the eighth day we approached the Continental River, which was both the widest and longest river on the continent. Beyond it lied the mountains the country was named for, and once we reached them the chances of attack dramatically decreased.

So of course, that is when things went wrong. Aiko barely shouts out a warning before they're upon us. The civilians were huddled in the first wagon, and Aiko hurriedly used an earth jutsu to erect a half dome protectively around them, leaving an opening to prevent enemies from tunnelling in from below without our notice. My blonde teammate proceeded to unseal her spear from her palm and position herself in front of the opening.

With knowledge that the clients are protected, I turned my focus to the enemy.

There was eight of them, half bearing the symbol for Cloud and half for Rock. Likely a team from each village, probably meeting each other.

A teenage boy came at me from the side, kunai swinging. I ducked out of the way, palming a kunai of my own. I used it to parry his next attack, and then jump back when one of his allies came at me from the other side.

I hastily cast a genjutsu on the two, using their distraction as an opening to attack with my kunai. I managed to shove my kunai up through the underside of the teenage boy's jaw, but the other ninja managed to break free from my illusion.

"You bitch!" he snarled when he saw his teammate laying on the ground, unmoving. He attacked me in a rage, forcing me back towards the first wagon as I dodged his fists. He was fast, but I was too, and I'd been drilled on dodging the way a medic is thanks to Tsunade-sensei, so he only got in a couple of glancing blows.

In the distance, I saw Sakura land a hit on one of the Cloud nin, caving in her skull. "Shannaro!"

As I approached Aiko and the wagon housing our clients, I weaved another genjutsu over my attacker. Since I was only targeting one person, I was able to use a more complex illusion that wasn't as easy to break out of. Someday, I would be able to do complex illusions on multiple targets, but that day was not today.

The chakra connection gave me the impression of what he was seeing, and I adjusted my chakra accordingly. I jumped up on his back so I was sitting on his shoulders, then grabbed his head and twisted. I jumped away before he even started to collapse. The connection cut out.

Surveying the area, I saw that Sakura was holding her own against a pair of enraged Cloud ninja, but that Aiko was struggling against the remaining three.

I hopped over, snaring them in a genjutsu as I approached, and their momentary distraction is all it took for Aiko to find an opening and thrust her spear through one of their necks. She shook him off her spear while using the blunt end to block the slash of of a sword from his teammate.

While Aiko handled the swordsman, the other began to sink into the ground, and I cursed, losing track of him.

The ground shifted beneath me, and I jumped out of the way of a massive spike, only for more sprout from the earth where ever I stood, driving me further and further from the caravan. In my attempts to avoid being impaled by stalagmites, I forgot to pay attention to where the ninja creating them was hiding. At the last second I saw him coming at me with a kunai and managed to avoid a knife to the eye, but taking it in the shoulder instead. My under armour did it's job though, and held up against the blade, keeping all but the tip from making it through.

He tried to disappear into the ground again, but I was expecting it this time. Before he was completely submerged, I slapped a seal tag on the ground, and instantly a crater was created as I sealed the earth away... And the portion of him that had sunk into it, leaving behind a cleanly cut torso.

I sprinted back towards the others, and saw that while I was dealing with the earth user, Aiko had finished off the swordsman. Sakura, meanwhile, was healing what appeared to a broken leg and a nasty burn on her arm simultaneously, with the remains of the two Cloud nin at her feet.

We regrouped, and waited to see if anyone else was coming. When no one appeared after a few moments, Sakura ducked into the wagon to check on the miners.

"You good?" Aiko asked me, and I nodded. I had a few new bruises and a small shoulder wound, but nothing too serious. I tilted my chin at her, silently asking after her. "I'm fine," she responded. Looking over her, I saw she had a few small nicks, but didn't appear to be severely injured. "Thanks for the assist with your genjutsu."

"Of course."

After Sakura ascertained that everyone was alive and finished healing us, we examined the damage.

In the commotion, several of the oxen had come unhooked and run off. Two of the carts were damaged, one only mildly, but the other was unsalvageable. The road was a mess of craters and stalagmites, making it obvious that some sort of fight had occurred here.

I sent Aiko out to find the missing oxen while Sakura changed a wheel on the cart with the help of one of our clients. I gathered up the remains of our enemies and sealed them away. Later, Sakura would set it on fire, together with destroyed wagon.

When Aiko returned with the oxen, the miners hooked them back up to the wagons. Sakura and Aiko worked together to repair the terrain, using super strength and earth jutsu respectively.

By the time we were done, no one would know anything happened here.

-x-

That night, while our clients slept, we discussed the team that attacked us in a mid-mission debriefing, to make sure we were all up to date on anything important.

"It wasn't a planned ambush," I deduced. "There were no traps, and they had little strategy. A team from Cloud and one from Rock, obviously working together, but no practice fighting alongside each other. They separated, mostly, when they attacked, instead of working together."

Aiko nodded in agreement. "They saw us and thought we'd be easy pickings." She tapped the side of her glasses, a signal indicating she'd read it in their minds.

"What rank do you suppose they were?" I asked.

Sakura hummed, gently nibbling on her lip. "I think the one who burned me was a special jounin, and the other two I took care of were definitely chuunin."

"I think the earth user I took on was a special jounin too. They were probably the leaders of each of the teams. I think one of the ones I took out was a genin, maybe a chuunin that wasn't a fighter." I tapped two fingers against my chin. "He probably had some sort of skill that was needed for whatever their mission was. The last one I got was a chuunin. Aiko?"

"Chuunin, the both of them." she offered. "I didn't learn anything about their mission."

"That's fine," I dismissed with a shrug. "That's not our job anyways."

-x-

The rest of the journey was uneventful. Once we crossed the river and started climbing the mountain trails, the temperature began to rapidly drop. The ground was littered with snow and ice, and we relied on cycling our chakra to keep us warm, while the miners bundled up in heavy winter coats and blankets in their wagon together.

We reached their village a week after the attack, slowed by the steep and icy roads. We were thanked for our services, and the leader of the miners let us spend the night at his home. We left early the morning of the sixteenth day.

Aiko took point and set the pace, as usual, and we skidded down the sides of the mountain instead of wasting time taking the roads. As we approached the Continental River again, we slowed down and employed every stealth technique Kairi-sensei taught us in an effort to avoid further conflict. Successful efforts, to our relief.

Once we returned to Fire Country, we picked up the pace again.

We crashed as soon as we got home, well after midnight. We all piled into my apartment to avoid dealing with other people. The three of us squeezed into my loft bed, lying on on top of each other.

-x-

We woke up slowly, languidly, until Aiko started stretching and accidentally shoved me off the bed. I scowled while Sakura and Aiko laughed at me, but I took the opportunity to get first dibs on the bathroom.

I took my time, taking a long, steaming shower, that left barely any hot water for my guests.

Once I was done I pulled up a rickety chair to my wobbly table and began writing my mission report. Meanwhile, Aiko took her turn in the bathroom and Sakura started on breakfast.

"Sorry, Sakura," Aiko said, toweling off her hair as she exited my washroom. " _Someone_ used up all the hot water."

The pinkette giggled as she set down two plates on the table, and left a third on the counter. "So that's what that scream was about. I'll just shower at home. Where I can take a bath after."

Aiko took the second chair at the table, and Sakura jumped up on the counter. They made light conversation while we ate, but I ignored them to focus on my report. I wanted to get it done soon, I was hoping to meet up with Itachi or Shisui later to work on my genjutsu. Preferably both, really.

The mission made it clear that I need to improve my multi-target genjutsu skills. I'd grown too used to only having a single target during interrogations. The only time I'd been using multi-target illusions was on missions within Fire country, or sometimes Red Bean, and not on any ninja.

I finished about an hour later, by which time my teammates had already left, so I headed to the tower to turn my report in.

By pure chance, I ran into Shisui as I was leaving the tower.

"Shisui! Do you have a moment?"

"For you Sekai-chan? Of course." he replied with a smile. "What can I do for you."

"I need your help with genjusu. Or Itachi, if he's in the village." I explained. Though our lessons had ended a few months back, both Uchiha had told me I could still come to them with any problems I was having.

"You're in luck, he's in village too."

A half hour later the three of us were sitting inside Suzuki Kashiya, discussing the issue.

"It sounds like your problem is splitting your concentration." Itachi suggested, nibbling on his dango.

Shisui hummed. "Perhaps. Are you using enough chakra? That could also be it." I shrugged. "Well, try a genjutsu on us, individually and then at the same time."

"Ready?" I inquired. Itachi and Shisui both nodded.

This was one of the great things about genjutsu. I mean, what other jutsu can you practice inside a store without getting in trouble?

-x-

It turned out both Itachi and Shisui were right. It was mostly a concentration issue, but I _was_ using less chakra than I should as well, which weakened my genjutsu. The latter was easy to fix. The former... not so much. It was just a matter of practice.

Sadly, I didn't get a chance to practice, because Team 4 was being sent out to the frontlines.

-x-

Notes: I'm terribly sorry for the pathetic fight scene. It's the first I've ever written, and well. I clearly need practice.

Before anyone complains about the girls holding their own against a genin, 5 chuunin and 2 special jounin, I'm gonna explain my reasoning.

For one, the battle lasted less than ten minutes. I imagine the weak one went after Sekai because she's small, and she took him out in a matter of seconds. The second dude she finished off in maybe two minutes. Aiko was able to hold the jounin and two chuunin off for a couple minutes thanks to knowing defensive earth jutsu and being skilled at blocking with her spear. Then Sekai helps Aiko kill one of the chuunin, and it turns into two one on one fights. Sakura meanwhile is fighting two chuunin and special jounin. They weren't expecting her strength, and the first chuunin she killed assumed she could handle a punch from a little girl. She was clearly wrong. Anyways, Sakura can 1-hit KO people, so she just needed to get a hit each on the remaining two, but got injured while doing so, which I think is realistic. Also, they drastically underestimated the girls.

I think canon's long, drawn out fights with all this talking and flashy jutsu don't fit with the setting. Ninja here are trained to end the fight as quickly and efficiently as possible, to go straight for the kill.

Anyways, hopefully with practice I'll get better at these fight scenes. I certainly hope I do because there are lots more to come in this arc.


End file.
